Insect digestion: Potential applications in insect management

The papers assembled in this special issue were originally presented by researchers gathered at an informal symposium entitled “Insect Digestion: Potential Applications in Insect Management” at the National Meeting of the Entomological Society of America in Fort Lauderdale, Florida in November 2002. Although symposium participants and attendees clearly came from a diversity of backgrounds, they shared a common goal: to bring together their collective knowledge of insect digestive physiology and promote discussions of control methods that target insect digestion. The manuscripts published in this issue reflect the breadth of that knowledge. They include a structural and functional study of a peptide hormone that modulates digestion in mosquitoes, investigation of responses of Colorado potato beetle to transgenically expressed proteinase inhibitors, demonstration of the importance of phosphorous as a nutritive element of caterpillars, and phylogenetic analysis of insect trypsins and inhibitor resistance. The papers reinforce the notion that approaches to the study of insect digestion are as diverse as the insects we study, and it is our hope that this endeavor will promote new ideas for effective pest management tools. The organizers would like to thank the Entomological Society of America for hosting the informal symposium, and to all who presented and attended. We are especially grateful to the Executive Editor of Archives of Insect Biochemistry and Physiology , David Stanley, and his editorial staff for making publication of this special issue possible.