Synergistic Toxicity of Plant Essential Oils Combined with Pyrethroid Insecticides against Blow Flies and the House Fly

Abstract

Blow flies (Diptera: Calliphoridae) and the house fly (Diptera: Muscidae) are filth flies of medical importance, and control of their population is needed. As insecticide applications have resulted in fly resistance, and the exploration of plant essential oils (EOs) has increased against filth flies, this study assessed the combination of EOs with pyrethoids to enhance toxic efficacy. The EOs of five effective plants were screened initially against the house fly (Musca domestica L.). Their chemical constituent was performed using gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS) analysis. The main components of Boesenbergia rotunda (Zingiberaceae) rhizome, Curcuma longa (Zingiberaceae) rhizome, Citrus hystrix (Rutaceae) fruit peel, Ocimum gratissimum (Lamiaceae) seed, and Zanthoxylum limonella (Rutaceae) fruit were δ-3-caren (35.25%), β-turmerone (51.68%), β-pinene (26.56%), p-cumic aldehyde (58.21%), and dipentene (60.22%), respectively. The screening test revealed that the three most effective plant EOs were from B. rotunda, C. longa and O. gratissimum, which were selected for the combination with two pyrethroid insecticides (permethrin and deltamethrin), in order to enhance their synergistic efficacy against the blow flies, Chrysomya megacephala Fabricius, Chrysomya rufifacies Macquart, and Lucilia cuprina Wiedemann, and the house fly. Synergistic action was presented in almost all of the flies tested with permenthrin/deltamethrin/EOs mixtures. It was interesting that the combination of deltamethrin with three EOs showed a synergistic effect on all of the tested flies. However, an antagonistic effect was observed in C. megacephala and M. domestica treated with permethrin-B. rotunda and C. megacephala treated with permethrin-O. gratissimum. The LD50 of insecticides decreased when combined with plant EOs. This alternative strategy will be helpful in developing a formula for effective fly control management.

Mosquitocidal activity of twenty-eight plant essential oils and their binary mixtures against Culex quinquefasciatus, (Diptera: Culicidae)

“…In case of larvae and adults, some of the binary combinations consisting of temephos or malathion are not found to bear synergistic interaction though they are individually effective as larvicides and adulticides. The possible explanation for such effect is that the synthetic insecticides possess high hydrophobicity and affinity with the essential oils due to which the molecules of the synthetic insecticides get dispersed in the essential oil and as a result bioavailability is decreased ( Suwannayod et al., 2019 ). However, in some cases the synergistic interaction is also recorded in the temephos or malathion-based combinations.…”

“…Synergistic combinations of two or more agents can overcome side effects associated with high doses of single one by decreasing the risk of resistance development, sparing doses on each compound, or accessing context-specific multi-target mechanisms ( Lehar et al., 2009 ; Youssefi et al., 2019 ). There have been fewer records of the use of essential oil mixtures as mosquitocidal, although few synergistic activity of mixtures of essential oils with synthetic insecticides have been reported against field crop pests and stored product pests ( Suwannayod et al., 2019 ). Moreover, the study on the potentiality of combinations purely made up of plant essential oils against mosquitoes is rare.…”

Search for Alternative Control Strategies of Drosophila suzukii (Diptera: Drosophilidae): Laboratory Assays Using Volatile Natural Plant Compounds

“…Further studies are necessary to detect the exact causes for the observed toxicity of the aforementioned test substances in our assays. For some EOs, a synergistic action with pyrethroid insecticides was observed [ 91 ]. Previous to the use in IPM strategies, it is thus essential to verify a potential interaction of an EO with insecticides of different modes of action to assure desired effects and avoid potential undesired antagonisms.…”

Characterization of Volatile Organic Compounds in Mango Ginger (Curcuma amada Roxb.) from Myanmar

“…It was also reported in the plant defense studies as one of the most abundant VOC in the HS of high-nitrogen and low-nitrogen plants and the release of which was not affected by nitrogen limitation [ 39 , 40 ]. The monoterpene o -cymol reported in the essential oils of several species has antifungal activity [ 41 , 42 , 43 , 44 ]. The compound α-humulene (α-caryophyllene), reported in other Curcuma species, has the antimicrobial activity [ 45 , 46 ].…”