Neonicotinoid insecticides are successfully applied to control pests in a variety of agricultural crops; however, they may not only affect pest insects but also non-target organisms such as pollinators. This review summarizes, for the first time, 15 years of research on the hazards of neonicotinoids to bees including honey bees, bumble bees and solitary bees. The focus of the paper is on three ...

The psyllid Diaphorina citri Kuwayama (Hemiptera: Psyllidae) is one of the most important pests of citrus worldwide because it efÞciently vectors three bacteria in the genus Candidatus Liberibacter that cause the devastating citrus greening disease (huanglongbing). Current management practices for this insect pest rely on multiple sprays of foliar insecticides and one or two applications of soi...

Large-scale use of the persistent and potent neonicotinoid and fipronil insecticides has raised concerns about risks to ecosystem functions provided by a wide range of species and environments affected by these insecticides. The concept of ecosystem services is widely used in decision making in the context of valuing the service potentials, benefits, and use values that well-functioning ecosyst...

Seed treatment as a method of local application pesticides in precise agriculture reduces the amount used per unit area and is considered to be safest, cheapest most ecologically acceptable protecting seeds young plants from pests early stages their development. With introduction insecticides neonicotinoid group mid-1990s, frequency seed increased. Due suspected negative effects on pollinators,...

The reasons for the decline are currently not clear. However, some studies have linked the reduction in bee numbers to a widely-used class of pesticides, neonicotinoids, that have been broadly administered in large-scale crop production since the mid 1990’s – the same time that mass bee disappearances started to be reported 2. These nicotine-like chemicals, which include three key neonicotinoid...

Neonicotinoid pesticides were first introduced in the mid-1990s, and since then, their use has grown rapidly. They are now the most widely used class of insecticides in the world, with the majority of applications coming from seed dressings. Neonicotinoids are water-soluble, and so can be taken up by a developing plant and can be found inside vascular tissues and foliage, providing protection a...

There has been great concern about negative effects on crop production resulting from the ban insecticide seed treatments containing neonicotinoids. I examine how neonicotinoid affected protection and in oilseed rape (Brassica napus L.) using Sweden as a case study compare Swedish situation with that leading countries growing winter spring rape, respectively. The cropping area of increased by a...

It has been suggested that the widespread use of neonicotinoid insecticides threatens bees, but research on this topic has been surrounded by controversy. In order to synthesize which research approaches have been used to examine the effect of neonicotinoids on bees and to identify knowledge gaps, we systematically reviewed research on this subject that was available on the Web of Science and P...

The binding interactions of two neonicotinoids, imidacloprid (IMI) and thiacloprid (THI) with the extracellular domains of cockroach and honeybee α6 nicotinic acetylcholine receptor (nAChR) subunits in an homomeric receptor have been studied through docking and molecular dynamics (MD) simulations. The binding mode predicted for the two neonicotinoids is validated through the good agreement obse...

Cotton is one of the most important cash crops of India. It is grown for its lint and seed. In India, cotton was cultivated on an area of 11.70 million ha with a production of 29.00 million bales of seed cotton during 2013-14. Average productivity of cotton in India is 540 kg lint per ha, which is low when compared to world average of 766 kg lint per ha (AICCIP, 2013-14). The major limiting fac...