I need to mark some aphids in a patch, but that cannot affect their behavior or the behavior of the parasitoid that will attack them (it is a parasitoid-host assay).
Here is an example of protein marking.
http://swfrec.ifas.ufl.edu/hlb/database/pdf/00001462.pdf
One could also use fluorescent nanoparticles for some applications.
http://hortsci.ashspublications.org/content/51/6/732.abstract
I know that the rubidium marking technique (see Ikbal's attachment) has been used in similar capacity for your application. Jay Rosenheim did some work with this technique: http://rosenheim.faculty.ucdavis.edu/.
Thank you Timothy!
The point is, that I need to keep the aphids after the oviposition in order to see if they have been parasitized or not. And I need to differ the aphids from one another.
Imagine a patch that I have 10 aphids; I need to differ the aphid #1 from the aphid #2, from the aphid #3 until the aphid #10. As the development of the parasitoid takes something like 7 days, I would need to put the aphids in a new plant, and be able to recognize these 10 from each other.
Thank you for the support anyway!
Why not have each aphid on a unique plant? You will have to find each aphid every day and remove offspring. A healthy aphid might have 6 to 10 nymphs each day. This will take a bit of time, and care not to disturb the mother too much. I would use small plants (little more than seedlings if possible) to make the task easier.
Because I need to do 25 replicates, for 2 different kinds of treatments. Also, there will be 4 aphids for replicate. I would need 200 plants, that's impossible to have (and really expensive...). The plants need to have young leaves, what is really difficult to obtain.
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