Heliothis virescens

Heliothis virescens, is a polyphagous Lepidopteran species found throughout North, Central, and South America. It is commonly known as the tobacco budworm and develops on tobacco, as well as cotton, soybeans, and garbanzo beans in its larval stages. Historical pressure by Heliothis virescens, a difficult to manage pest due to its ability to adapt to insecticides, has shaped current cotton cultivation practices in the southern United States. Today, much of the cotton grown in the United States is genetically modified to express Bt toxins, in part due to the efficacy of these toxins against Heliothis virescens. The genome assembly of Heliothis virescens was produced as part of a USDA-funded project to determine how Lepidopteran pests adapt to the widespread distribution of Bt-expressing corn and cotton in the landscape.

Genome update. Previously, the i5k Workspace@NAL hosted Heliothis virescens genome assembly K63_refined_pacbio 1 GCA_002382865.1, Heliothis virescens H virescens OGS1, and Functional annotation of Heliothis virescens H virescens OGS1. The assembly and annotations have updated to the most recent assembly, Heliothis virescens genome assembly ASM238286v2 (GCA_002382865.2) (https://ftp.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/genomes/all/GCA/002/382/865/GCA_002382865.2_ASM238286v2/), Heliothis virescens Official Gene Set OGS 1.1 (https://i5k.nal.usda.gov/data/Arthropoda/helvir-%28Heliothis_virescens%29/ASM238286v2/), and Functional annotation of Heliothis virescens annotations OGS 1.1 (https://i5k.nal.usda.gov/data/Arthropoda/helvir-%28Heliothis_virescens%29/ASM238286v2/2.Official%20or%20Primary%20Gene%20Set/).