TNIBASE.ORG

The cabbage looper, Trichoplusia ni (Lepidoptera: Noctuidae) is a generalist herbivorous insect with a host range of over 160 plant species from 36 families. Its geographic distribution covers all continents where crucifer crops are cultivated. As a highly polyphagous noctuid generalist and an important agricultural pest, T. ni is widely used for studying fundamental insect physiology, biochemistry and molecular biology, insect-plant interactions and insect chemical ecology, and insect-microbe interactions and insect pathology. In addition, T. ni has also been used as a herbovirous insect to investigate effects of environmental contanimants on agricultural ecosystems and to study tritrophic interactions among host plants, insects and microbes. T. ni is the standard species for titration of insecticidal potencies of Bacillus thuringiensis (Bt) products, the most widely used biopesticides, to define the international units of Bt potency in industry, and the cell lines TN-368 and High..