Moths are diverse group of insects belonging to the order Lepidoptera and suborder Heterocera. They are regarded as one of the indicators of a healthy environment. This study deals with the first checklist of moth species in Madras Christian College campus, Tambaram. The study was carried out from December 2018 to September 2019. In total, 32 species of moths were identified from 29 genera falling under 9 families. The Moths identified belonged to the families of Erebidae, Noctuidae, Crambidae, Sphingidae, Eupterotidae, Uraniidae, Saturniidae, Geometridae and Tineidae of which, family Erebidae was found to be the superior family. The results of this preliminary study sheds light on the unknown biodiversity of moth, which needs to be strengthened through comprehensive future surveys. The objective of this study is to document moth diversity in Madras Christian College, Tambaram.

A survey on the diversity and abundance of marine gastropods was undertaken along the coast of Chennai, and Chengalpattu Districts of Tamilnadu, India. The study was conducted in Ennore, Neelankarai, and Kovalam. A total of 41 species of gastropods belonging to 5 orders, 24 families, and 31 genera were identified. In all three sites, the species Murex tribulus was found to be in abundance, followed by Turritella duplicata, Turritella attenuata, and Babylonia spirata. Three genera of Bufonaria and Turritella were recorded. A total of 6 species were reported belonging to the family Muricidae. The maximum diversity of species was found to be in Ennore. It may be due to the estuarine habitat, more organic sediments, and other resources.

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Brinjal or eggplant is a very important crop (vegetable) of sub-tropics and tropics of India. This plant is highly infested by, Henosepilachna vigintioctopunctata (Coleoptera: Coccinellidae). It is a polyphagous pest in nature, the adult and grub stages cause severe damage to the plants by feeding on its leaves, flowers and vegetables and create a heavy economic loss. Though the beetles could be controlled using synthetic pesticides, indiscriminate use of pesticide in the field causes problems such as pest resistance, environmental and health hazards etc. These pave way for the development of effective ecofriendly pest control measures. Plant based essential oils are used against these insect pests, as they constitute a rich source of bioactive components and reported to have many biological properties. Recently, essential oils were formulated as nanoemulsion and was developed for their effectiveness and eco-friendly nature. In this study, the oil in water (O/W) nanoemulsion of Mentha piperita were prepared by ultrasonication method at different concentrations and examined for the stability study. The stable nanoemulsion was characterized by DLS and was reported to consist with a mean droplet size of 10.84 nm, PDI was 0.1 and zeta potential was -45 mv which proved the good stability of the nanoemulsion. To assess the efficacy of the formulated nanoemulsion, and bulkemulsion, it was screened against the adult beetles, Henosepilachna vigintioctopunctata at different concentrations for 96 hours and the resulted LC 50 value of nanoemulsion was 15.84 % which was found to be very effective than the LC 50 value of bulkemulsion, which was 60.25 %. Hence from the results obtained, Mentha piperita nanoemulsion may be used as an organic pesticide because of its higher efficacy against the adult beetles, Henosepilachna vigintioctopunctata.