2006 Annual Report 4d.Progress report. This report serves to document research conducted under a specific cooperative agreement (1926-22000-019-04S - Agreement # 58-1926-3-330) between ARS and Cornell University, Ithaca, New York, USA. Additional details of research can be found in the report for the parent CRIS 1926-22000-019-00D, Development of Biological Control and Related Technologies for Invasive Insect Pests with Emphasis on the Asian Longhorn Beetle. The project objective is to develop methods for optimizing control of Asian Longhorned beetle using entomopathogenic fungi, especially focusing on the use of non-woven fiber bands for fungal delivery. (1) Fecundity Studies: We completed data analysis of our study of the effects of fungal band exposure on mature, ovipositing females to M. anisopliae relative to: (a) horizontal transmission to mates; (b) resulting egg production; (c) resulting egg hatch and infection; and (d) resulting larval survival and infection. This was written up for publication. However, during literature review to write the Introduction and Discussion of a paper for a peer-reviewed journal we realized that we really should also include females that were not yet laying eggs. This is especially important since a goal of use of fungal bands is that females that are not yet laying eggs will cross bands, become contaminated and die from infections. In this scenario, fungal bands would prevent eggs from being laid or only few viable eggs would be laid. We’ve seen this effect in the field but we’ve never documented this in the laboratory. Therefore, we repeated this study using females that had only recently eclosed. In July, the last beetles died from this study. Data summarization is complete and analysis is next on the list. We do not foresee that writing will take long since we’ve already written up the first part of the study. (2) Dose Response Studies: Dose response studies are presently being conducted using M. anisopliae F-52. It’s taken some time to develop a method for adjusting fungal doses but a method is presently in place and working well. Dr. Jarrod Leland has been making fungal bands for us but we had some problems with some of his bands and we had to wait for a new batch (this requires approximately 1 month). In the recent past (so these studies are not at all covered by funding from this cooperative agreement), the growth chamber we were using in the USDA, ARS quarantine that houses our ALB colony went haywire and several replicates for our dose response studies were ruined. We decided not to continue with these studies until we had better equipment. Thus, I’ve put my time and effort into completing the permitting process so that we could move the ALB colony to a new Cornell quarantine facility. We moved ALB into the new quarantine on October 2, 2006. However, we could only move larvae and we need adults for our studies so it will take a little while before we can recommence studies.