A disease called ash dieback is killing Europe’s ash trees. And now they face another new threat: Emerald ash borer, an Asian native that has wiped out millions of ashes in the U.S. and Canada, including Ohio. BBC Radio 4 recently talked with CFAES’s Enrico Bonello about the insect’s devastating impact (link to audio; his interview starts at around 19:11 but the whole story’s worth a listen). (Photo: David Cappaert, Michigan State University, Bugwood.org.)
emerald ash borer
Studing EAB resistance: Not futile?
Emerald Ash Borer (EAB), an invasive insect native to Asia, is infesting ash trees (Fraxinus spp.) in the northern U.S. and Canada. The news gets worse: all North American ash species are susceptible to EAB. Aiming to develop management strategies, recent PhD graduate Justin Whitehill and faculty advisor Pierluigi Bonello (Department of Plant Pathology) are studying the Manchurian ash, an Asian species with natural resistance to EAB. Using biochemical and molecular tools, they are working to identify biochemical markers associated with resistance. In the long term, they also hope that understanding ash resistance to EAB may lead to new tools such as bio-insecticides. For more info > http://go.osu.edu/DCy