Enhancement of Bt-Plus Toxicity by Unidentified Biological Response Modifiers Derived from the Bacterial Culture Broth of Xenornabdus nematiphila

`Bt-Plus` has been developed by mixing spores of Bacillus thuringiensis (Bt) and culture broth of Xenorhabdus nematophila (Xn). Despite its high toxicity, it has some imitation to broaden its efficacy against diverse insect pest spectrum. This study focuses on enhancement of Bt-Plus toxicity against semi-susceptible insect, Spodoptera exitgua, by addition of Xn metabolites. Two main Xn metabolites, oxindole (OI) and benzylideneacetone (BZA), are known to enhance the Bt insecticidal activities. The addition of OI or BZA significantly increased Bt-Plus pathogenicity. However, when the freeze-dried Xn culture broth was added to Bt-Plus, much less amount was enough to enhance the toxicity compared to the amount of OI or BZA. An HPLC analysis indicated that there were more than 12 unidentifed bacterial metabolites in Xn culture broth. These suggest that there are potent biological response modifiers in Xn metabolites other than OI and BZA.