A strategy to enhance the insecticidal potency of Vip3Aa by introducing additional cleavage sites to increase its proteolytic activation efficiency

•Vip3Aa has multiple cleavage activation sites in the loop region between domain I and domain II.•Introducing additional cleavage sites between domain I and domain II of vip3Aa can significantly increase its proteolytic efficiency by midgut juice.•Increasing the proteolytic efficiency of vip3Aa can promote its insecticidal potency.