The diamondback moth, Plutella xylostella (L), is recognized as a widely distributed and serious pest of crucifers in many countries. In some countries, however, it is effectively suppressed by parasites. These are critically examined as are the various attempts to import parasites and to release them. The appraisal reveals that the parasites of P. xylostella are a valuable control component an...

Contarinia nasturtii (Kieffer) (Diptera: Cecidomyiidae), a common insect pest in Europe and a new invasive pest in North America, causes severe damage to cruciferous crops. Currently, many counties in Canada and the United States in which C. nasturtii has not been previously reported are at risk of being infested by C. nasturtii. Effectiveness of chemical control is limited, especially under hi...

Some extracts from neem seeds/neem seed kernels can give satisfactory to good control of diamondback moth, Plutella xylostella (L.), in cabbage and other crucifers. Water extracts prove most effective, sometimes even at low concentrations as low as 12.5 g of seed kernels per liter of water, provided the raw material contains sufficient azadirachtin. Neem could be developed into products suitabl...

The pollen-stigma interaction of self-incompatibility in crucifers is correlated with glycoproteins localized in the cell wall of the stigmatic papillae that are encoded by the S locus glycoprotein (SLG) gene. When fused to the [beta]-glucuronidase (GUS) reporter gene, the 5[prime] upstream regulatory region of SLG directed high level expression in the papillae of transgenic Brassica plants. Hi...

Comparative genomics provides a tool to utilize the exponentially increasing sequence information from model plants to clone agronomically important genes from less studied crop species. Plant disease resistance (R) loci frequently lack synteny between related species of cereals and crucifers but appear to be positionally well conserved in the Solanaceae. In this report, we adopted a local RGA ...

High consumption of cruciferous vegetables is associated with a reduced risk of prostate cancer in epidemiological studies. There is preliminary evidence that sulforaphane, derived from glucoraphanin found in a number of crucifers, may prevent and induce regression of prostate cancer and other malignancies in preclinical models, but the mechanisms that may explain these effects are not fully de...

Evidence has recently been presented for the natural occurrence of S-methylcysteine in kidney bean seeds (2) and in Neurospora crassa (3). The sulfoxide of S-methylcysteine has also been shown to occur in relatively high concentrations in the nonprotein nitrogen fraction of turnips, cabbage, and several other crucifers (4, 5). It is also of interest that the peptide, y-glutamyl-Smethylcysteine,...

The well supported gene dosage hypothesis predicts that genes encoding proteins engaged in dose-sensitive interactions cannot be reduced back to single copies once all interacting partners are simultaneously duplicated in a whole genome duplication. The genomes of extant flowering plants are the result of many sequential rounds of whole genome duplication, yet the fraction of genomes devoted to...

An invasive stink bug, Bagrada hilaris (Burmeister) (Hemiptera: Pentatomidae), was discovered in theWestern Hemisphere in 2008 near Los Angeles, CA, presumably introduced on container shipments arriving at the Port of Long Beach. In the subsequent 4 years, it has spread throughout southern California, southern areas of Arizona, Nevada, and Utah, southern and west–central New Mexico, and extreme...

Yellow rocket, Barbarea vulgaris (R. Br.) variety arcuata, was evaluated as a trap crop for diamondback moth, Plutella xylostella (L.) (Lepidoptera: Plutellidae), in cabbage, Brassica oleracea L. variety capitata, in 2003 and 2004. In 2003, the numbers of P. xylostella larvae found in field plots of cabbage alone were 5.2-11.3 times higher than those on cabbage plants in plots that included cab...