The close proximity of Liwonde National Park to Liwonde town creates a unique situation of a large human population adjacent to a natural undisturbed animal reserve. The closeness of the two ecosystems has an impact on biology of mosquitoes of the area, such as susceptibility to insecticides. Susceptibility to insecticide was determined using knockdown bioassays. The mosquito, Anopheles gambiae...

Locusts and grasshoppers (acridids) are among the worst pests of crops and grasslands worldwide. Metarhizium acridum, a fungal pathogen that specifically infects acridids, has been developed as a control agent but its utility is limited by slow kill time and greater expense than chemical insecticides. We found that expression of four insect specific neurotoxins improved the efficacy of M. acrid...

Beta-cyfluthrin (OMS 3051), a new synthetic pyrethroid and one of the stereoisomers of cyfluthrin, was studied for insecticidal activity against eight mosquito species. Its larvicidal activity with LC50 values of 5.62 x 10(-5) and 1.19 x 10(-4) mg/l respectively for Culex quinquefasciatus and Aedes aegypti was comparable with that of deltamethrin. This pyrethroid was more effective against the ...

Boric acid, imidacloprid, and thiamethoxam in sucrose aqueous baits had different delayed toxicities toworker Argentine ants,Linepithema humile (Mayr). The concentrations required toproduce anLT50 (time required toproduce 50%mortality)within 1Ð4dwere 3.63Ð0.55%boric acid, 9.2 10 3 to 7.1 10 % imidacloprid, and 3 10 4 to 2 10 % thiamethoxam. The three toxicants were not repellent. Other laborato...

Genetically modified baculoviruses offer a promising alternative to chemical insecticides in the control of agricultural and forest insect pests. A novel bacmid, HaBacYH6, was constructed in which the ecdysteroid UDP-glucosyltransferase gene (egt) was replaced with a bacterial replication cassette containing a mini-F replicon, a kanamycin resistance gene, and the attTn7 site. Insertion of the e...

The adulticidal activity of methanol extracts from three Malaysian plants namely Acorus calamus Linn., Litsea elliptica Blume and Piper aduncum Linn. against adult of Aedes aegypti (L.) were studied. Standard WHO bioassay tests were used to evaluate the effectiveness of these plant extracts. The hexane fraction from methanol extract of Acorus calamus rhizome was the most effective, exhibiting L...