Pests, genetic studies

Genetic studies have raised many new questions. In pursuit of answers to these questions, the knowledge gained should lead to improved strategies for resistance management. In conclusion, some of these questions will be considered, and then prospects for genetic research on mayor pest species will be discussed. 

Genetic Control. Manipulation of the mechanisms of inheritance of the insect pest populations has occurred most successhiUy through the mass release of steri1i2ed males, but a variety of other techniques have been studied, including the environmental use of chemostetilants and the mass introduction of deleterious mutations, eg, conditional lethals and chromosomal translocations (58 ndash 60) (see Genetic engineering). 

A Manageable Challenge. At the same time, there are positive aspects in the realization that resistance is part of a larger, ongoing biological process. As a natural phenomenon, controlled by genetics and expressed in specific biochemical processes, resistance can be studied, understood, and combated. It is neither mysterious nor totally beyond our control. This is particularly true if strategies and tactics to avoid or delay resistance are implemented proactively, before resistant pests become serious problems i.e. before the survival characteristics become common in the population. 

Clearly the tobacco budworm is a highly adaptable species that possesses an impressive arsenal of natural physiological and biochemical defense mechanisms which can be brought to bear against a broad spectrum of xenobiotic compounds. Furthermore, recent laboratory studies have shown that the genetic traits of the pest also favor the development of significant levels of resistance to pyrethroids (36.371 when it is subjected to selection pressure. 

---