In vitro mass production of entomopathogenic nematodes on solid media: A review

Abstract

Entomopathogenic nematodes, obligate insect pathogens, are widely used as biocontrol agents against economically important insect pests in different farming systems because they provide environmentally safe and sustainable crop protection. Hence the most important thing for the successful and reasonable usage of EPNs in crop protection is their production on large scale at competitive cost within a short time. In parallel to this, EPNs can be easily cultured either in-vivo or in vitro in the laboratory. The in vivo production is quite simple process as it involves the culturing on live insect host on the White Trap method, which involves the natural migration of IJs away from the infected host cadaver into the surrounding w+** ater layer. But the commercial production is quite impracticable due to high production costs, lacks of economies of scale and low nematode yields per gram of insect biomass. In place of that, the in vitro solid technology gives higher nematode yields per gram of solid media, which is based on introducing nematodes to a pure culture of the symbiotic bacteria into a nutritive, non-living medium that contains the sterile ingredients.