Acyrthosiphon pisum

 Aphids (4,000 species) are responsible for a great deal of damage, especially in temperate regions where they are the principal cause of devastation in numerous plant species. These biting-sucking insects feed on the phloem sap of plants and depreciate the quality of agricultural products. Several viruses circulate in the phloem and aphids are efficient vectors for them, causing major epidemics of virus diseases.
The loss in yields for agriculture is difficult to evaluate becase it is dependent on species, crops, regions and countries. For example, aphids of cereal plants may lead to losses of 30% in wheat crops (draining of sap, depreciation of agricultural products) and up to 50% in barley (viral diseases) in France.
There have been multiple failures in the fight against these aphids, due to the appearance of clones which are resistant to insecticides or which can overcome plant resistance, or lead to an increase in virus diseases. The identification of genes which are markers for the destructive potential of aphids should lead to the discovery of future targets for the development of new active molecules.

Aphids colonies

Furthermore, because of their unique characteristics, aphids constitute a choice biological material for approaching important questions of theory and experimentation in evolutionary biology such as the evolution of reproductive systems (asexual-sexual) or symbiosis (endosymbiotic bacteria).
Aphid genomics has been an example of a collaborative international network structure from the beginning, as evidenced by the presence of foreign groups in this project. France is one of the leaders of this network.