Life stage-dependent genetic traits as drivers of plant–herbivore interactions

In recent decades, we have come to understand in great detail the mechanisms that allow plants and herbivorous arthropods to withstand each other. Research into these interactions often focuses on specific life stages of plants and animals, often for pragmatic reasons. Yet it is well known that the lifecycles of plants and herbivores are accompanied by niche shifts that can change their interactions. The occurrence of changes in the defensive regulatory and metabolic networks of plants during their development as driver of plant–herbivore interactions is mainly inferred from behavioral patterns, but there is increasingly molecular-mechanistic data to support the causality. In particular, understanding the molecular-mechanistic signatures of ontogenetic niche shifts, and their genetic basis, may prove to be critical for the design of knowledge-based crop protection strategies.