Movement and Motion of Soybean Cyst Nematode, Heterodera glycines, Populations and Individuals in Response to Abamectin

Two new in vitro methods were developed to analyze plant-parasitic nematode behavior, at the population and the individual organism levels, through time-lapse image analysis. The first method employed a high-resolution flatbed scanner to monitor the movement of a population of nematodes over a 24-hour period at 25°C. The second method tracked multiple motion parameters of individual nematodes on a microscopic scale, using a high-speed camera. Changes in movement and motion of second-stage juveniles (J2s) of the soybean cyst nematode, Heterodera glycines Ichinohe, were measured after exposure to a serial dilution of abamectin (0.1 μg/ml to 100 μg/ml). Movement and motion of H. glycines were significantly reduced as the concentration of abamectin increased. The effective range of abamectin to inhibit movement and motion of H. glycines J2s was between 1.0 μg/ml and 10 μg/ml. Proof-of-concept experiments for both methods produced one of the first in vitro sensitivity studies of H. glycines to abamectin. The two methods developed allow for higher-throughput analysis of nematode movement and motion and provide objective and data-rich measurements that are difficult to achieve from conventional microscopic laboratory methods