World Congress on
Plant Genomics and Plant Science

Ms. Wei-An Tsai has received her Bachelor’s degree in Department of Plant Pathology and Microbiology, National Taiwan University; master’s degree at the Institute of plant biology (IPB), National Taiwan University. Her expertise in plant pathology and plant biology enables her developing novel strategies for managing plant pests and integrating research methods of molecular biology with plant stress biology. In her career as an assistant researcher in Hualien District Agriculture Research and Extension Station (HDARES), she has developed a variety of valid pest control agents, including biostimulant which can induce plant immunity to confers resistance to TYLCV and microbial agent Bacillus methylotrophicus HL_B01 controlling plant bacterial soft rot disease. Ms. Tsai also dedicates herself in solving farmer’s problems by organic and eco-friendly managing approaches, providing her a chance to joined IUCN (International Union for Conservation of Nature) congress as a representative of HDARES and giving an as a speaker in a workshop “Promoting agricultural landscapes that are good for people and nature.”

Plant viral diseases usually cause the loss of crop production as well as there is no pesticide can effectively control them. However, the control of insect vectors has become a critical approach to solve this problem. Whitefly (Bemisia argentifolii Bellows and Perring) is one of the important cucurbit pests known to specifically transmit Begomoviruses, and Squash leaf curl virus Philippines (SLCPHV) has become widespread in Taiwan in recent years. Another notorious insect vectors, aphids, are also known to spread at least four common plant viral diseases that damage Cucurbitaceae crops commonly. Living and synthetic mulches were evaluated for control of the Bemisia argentifolii Bellows and Perring and aphids. This study concentrates on how to apply white clover (Trifolium repens L.) for being as cover plant in pumpkin cultivation. It shows that whitefly populations in white clover treatment significantly reduced, and infection rate of SLCPHV was 55.2 %, significantly lower than those of synthetic (reflective) mulches with 91.3 % and oligomeric galacturonic acid spray treatment with 95.2 %. The proportion of viral infection symptoms occurrence was about 13% at the end of the experiment. This study suggests that white clover would control the population of whiteflies in pumpkin field efficiently. With potential to be applied to construct organic pumpkin cultivation environment