Improving crop yield from agriculturally significant plants including, among others, corn, soybean, sugarcane, rice, wheat, vegetables, and cotton, has become increasingly important. In addition to the growing need for agricultural products to feed, clothe and provide energy for a growing human population, climate-related effects and pressure from the growing population to use land other than for agricultural practices are predicted to reduce the amount of arable land available for farming. These factors have led to grim forecasts of food security, particularly in the absence of major improvements in plant biotechnology and agronomic practices. In light of these pressures, environmentally sustainable improvements in technology, agricultural techniques, and pest management are vital tools to expand crop production on the limited amount of arable land available for farming.
Insects, particularly insects within the order Lepidoptera and Coleoptera, are considered a major cause of damage to field crops, thereby decreasing crop yields over infested areas. Lepidopteran pest species which negatively impact agriculture include, but are not limited to, Beet armyworm (Spodoptera exigua), Corn earworm (Helicoverpa zea), Cotton leaf worm (Alabama argillacea), European corn borer (Ostrinia nubilalis), Fall armyworm (Spodoptera frugiperda), Old World bollworm (Helicoverpa armigera), Oriental leaf worm (Spodoptera litura), Pink bollworm (Pectinophora gossypiella), Cry1Ac resistant Pink bollworm (Pectinophora gossypiella), Soybean looper (Chrysodeixis includens), Southern armyworm (Spodoptera eridania), Southwestern corn borer (Diatraea grandiosella), Spotted bollworm (Earias vittella), Sugarcane borer (Diatraea saccharalis), Tobacco budworm (Heliothis virescens), and Velvet bean caterpillar (Anticarsia gemmatalis).
Historically, the intensive application of synthetic chemical insecticides was relied upon as the pest control agent in agriculture. Concerns for the environment and human health, in addition to emerging resistance issues, stimulated the research and development of biological pesticides. This research effort led to the progressive discovery and use of various entomopathogenic microbial species, including bacteria.
The biological control paradigm shifted when the potential of entomopathogenic bacteria, especially bacteria belonging to the genus Bacillus, was discovered and developed as a biological pest control agent. Strains of the bacterium Bacillus thuringiensis (Bt) have been used as a source for pesticidal proteins since it was discovered that Bt strains show a high toxicity against specific insects. Bt strains are known to produce delta-endotoxins that are localized within parasporal crystalline inclusion bodies at the onset of sporulation and during the stationary growth phase (e.g., Cry proteins), and are also known to produce secreted insecticidal protein. Upon ingestion by a susceptible insect, delta-endotoxins as well as secreted toxins exert their effects at the surface of the midgut epithelium, disrupting the cell membrane, leading to cell disruption and death. Genes encoding insecticidal proteins have also been identified in bacterial species other than Bt, including other Bacillus and a diversity of additional bacterial species, such as Brevibacillus laterosporus, Lysinibacillus sphaericus (“Ls” formerly known as Bacillus sphaericus) and Paenibacillus popilliae. 
Crystalline and secreted soluble insecticidal toxins are highly specific for their hosts and have gained worldwide acceptance as alternatives to chemical insecticides. For example, insecticidal toxin proteins have been employed in various agricultural applications to protect agriculturally important plants from insect infestations, decrease the need for chemical pesticide applications, and increase yields. Insecticidal toxin proteins are used to control agriculturally-relevant pests of crop plants by mechanical methods, such as spraying to disperse microbial formulations containing various bacteria strains onto plant surfaces, and by using genetic transformation techniques to produce transgenic plants and seeds expressing insecticidal toxin protein.
The use of transgenic plants expressing insecticidal toxin proteins has been globally adapted. For example, in 2012, 26.1 million hectares were planted with transgenic crops expressing Bt toxins (James, C., Global Status of Commercialized Biotech/GM Crops: 2012. ISAAA Brief No. 44). The global use of transgenic insect-protected crops and the limited number of insecticidal toxin proteins used in these crops has created a selection pressure for existing insect alleles that impart resistance to the currently-utilized insecticidal proteins.
The development of resistance in target pests to insecticidal toxin proteins creates the continuing need for discovery and development of new forms of insecticidal toxin proteins that are useful for managing the increase in insect resistance to transgenic crops expressing insecticidal toxin proteins. New protein toxins with improved efficacy and which exhibit control over a broader spectrum of susceptible insect species will reduce the number of surviving insects which can develop resistance alleles. In addition, the use in one plant of two or more transgenic insecticidal toxin proteins toxic to the same insect pest and displaying different modes of action reduces the probability of resistance in any single target insect species.
Thus, the inventors disclose herein a novel protein toxin family from Bacillus thuringiensis, along with similar toxin proteins, variant proteins, and exemplary recombinant proteins that exhibit insecticidal activity against target Lepidopteran species, particularly against Beet armyworm (Spodoptera exigua), Corn earworm (Helicoverpa zea), Cotton leaf worm (Alabama argillacea), European corn borer (Ostrinia nubilalis), Fall armyworm (Spodoptera frugiperda), Old World bollworm (Helicoverpa armigera), Oriental leaf worm (Spodoptera litura), Pink bollworm (Pectinophora gossypiella), Cry1Ac resistant Pink bollworm (Pectinophora gossypiella), Soybean looper (Chrysodeixis includens), Southern armyworm (Spodoptera eridania), Southwestern corn borer (Diatraea grandiosella), Spotted bollworm (Earias vittella), Sugarcane borer (Diatraea saccharalis), Tobacco budworm (Heliothis virescens), and Velvet bean caterpillar (Anticarsia gemmatalis).