Plant viruses can modify the performance and behavior of insect vectors to maximize their transmission rates. Whether viruses can evolve to mediate their insect vectors’ interspecific competition is poorly understood. Here, we used two vectors of tomato zonate spot virus (TZSV), one native species (Thrips palmi) and one exotic species (Frankliniella occidentalis), to investigate this in laboratory and field experiments. TZSV infection increased the population growth of its insect vectors when the thrips species were isolated from one another. When both species coexisted, F. occidentalis displaced T. palmi on both TZSV-infected and uninfected plants. However, on TZSV-infected plant, F. occidentalis completely displaced T. palmi more rapidly (within 14 days) than on uninfected plants. Our results also revealed that reproductive interference occurred between the two thrips species, whereas TZSV-infected pepper significantly decreased the reproductive interference of T. palmi to F. occidentalis. When F. occidentalis and T. palmi co-occurred in Jinning County, Yunnan Province, we found a rising trend of natural proportions of F. occidentalis in the TZSV-infected pepper fields, suggesting that TZSV-infected pepper enhanced the competitive advantage of F. occidentalis over T. palmi in the field. Together, our findings demonstrate a plant virus that plays an important role in the competitive displacement of its insect vectors.

植物病毒可以改变昆虫载体的性能和行为，以使其传播速率最大化。病毒是否可以进化来介导其昆虫载体的种间竞争知之甚少。在这里，我们在实验室和田间实验中使用了两种番茄带状斑点病毒（TZSV）载体，一种本地物种（Thrips palmi）和一种外来物种（Frankliniella occidentalis）进行了研究。当蓟马种相互分离时，TZSV感染增加了其昆虫媒介的种群增长。当这两种物种同时存在时，西方花椰菜在TZSV感染和未感染的植物上都取代了棕榈棕。但是，在受TZSV感染的植物上，西方球藻（在14天之内）比未感染的植物更快地完全取代了棕榈锥虫。我们的研究结果还显示，两个蓟马种间发生生殖干扰，而TZSV感染辣椒显著下降的生殖干扰棕榈蓟马到西花蓟马。在云南省晋宁县同时发生西花蓟马和棕榈蓟马时，我们发现在TZSV感染的辣椒田中西花蓟马的天然比例呈上升趋势，这表明TZSV感染的辣椒增强了F的竞争优势。。望江南在棕榈蓟马在该领域。总之，我们的发现表明一种植物病毒在其昆虫载体的竞争性替代中起着重要作用。