Insect attractants synthetic

Many insects attract a mate by releasing a volatile organic compound known as a pheromone. Pheromones are highly specific to species, and provide a cunning means of controlling pests place a pad of cotton wool soaked in male pheromone inside a trap, and in drop all the female pests—no next generation. If insect control is to rely on a supply of the pheromone, that supply has to be synthetic—it takes enormous numbers of squashed insects to provide even a few milligrams of most pheromones. 

An approach to the control of insects thot is gaining acceptance is based on the use of synthetic chemicals as insect attractants. Because many insects depend for their survival on odors which moy lead them to food, water, the opposite sex, or oviposition sites, they can frequently be attracted by means of a chemicol to a trap for detection purposes, or to a toxicant that destroys the insect. This paper deals with some of the known insect attractants, describes how they are found, discusses uses and kinds of attractants, and shows how attractants can increase the efficiency of insect-control operations. 

Pheromones—Some insects (and insect-like organisms) produce natural chemicals, called pheromones, which cause responses in other insects of the same or very closely related species. Once a particular insect pheromone is identified and the chemical is synthetically produced, it can be used to disrapt the behavior of that insect species. Synthetic pheromones may be used to disrupt normal reproduction, or they may be used to attract the pests into a trap. 

I. a. both species-specific pheromones and natural or synthetic foreign substances, provided that they possess insect-attracting properties, are used. o-MeAyl-eugenol, anisylacetone, geraniol/ eugenol have proved to be useful in various mixtures as I. a. for certain species. 4-(p-Hydroxyphenyl)-2-butanone (CI oH 12O2, Mr 164.20) and its acetate are commercially available as I. a. for the Mediterranean fruit fly Cera-titis capitata see also pheromones, allomones, syn-omones, kairomones, semiochemicals. 

Uses in perfumery synthetic flavoring substance and adjuvant insect attractant some perfumery uses (peony rose Centifolia magnolia orange juice petitgrain lemon petitgrain) natural occurrence (rose) A... 

Eiter 83) has recently presented some critical comments on insect attractants and the work on the pink bollworm in particular. As sex attraction activity is brought about by so little material in the Lepidoptera and as it is difficult to obtain really pure configurations of olefins and polyolefins, Eiter 83) questions the validity of some of the identifications. However, the two-component pheromone described in the preceding paragraph was independently identified by two groups (79, 233), and extensive field tests with the synthetic material have been very successful (Section VII D). 

The insect s choice of food may be governed to a considerable extent, as ours is, by attractants and repellents. In many instances, the actual insecticidal action of plant extractives may be due primarily to an artificially high level of application, while, in fact, the parent plants are only repellent in the field. This repellency may appear to be resistance on the part of the plant, and the chemistry of such resistance factors has begun to receive much-needed attention. For example, Smissman and his coworkers have examined the chemical basis for the inherited resistance of some strains of corn to attack by the European corn borer. 6-Methoxybenzoxazolinone (X) was isolated (2, SO) and shown to be one of the principal resistance factors, and a number of synthetic analogs were found to... 

Attractive Compounds. Pheromones of dermestid beetles were among the first ones identified from insects. Almost all have been described as one-component-systems , and re-investigations employing refined techniques, especially GC-EAD and sensitive GC-MS, may reveal the presence of additional and important compounds, which may lead to improved activity of synthetic lures, and under natural conditions may account for species specificity etc. 

Open dumps pose a number of environmental problems, however. For example, they tend to attract rats, flies, gulls, insects, and other undesirable animals. Those animals not only are unsightly but also transmit a variety of diseases. In addition, open dumps tend to produce offensive odors that are carried to nearby residents. Dumps also tend to catch fire spontaneously, filling the air with additional unpleasant odors, as well as noxious and toxic fumes from burning rubber, plastic, and other synthetic chemicals. 

Biochemical pesticides include all naturally occurring substances (or their structurally similar synthetic analogs) that are intended for use as attractants, repellents, desiccants, semiochemicals, plant and insect regulators, and induced systemic response (ISR) and systemic acquired response (SAR) inducers. 

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