Enzyme inhibitors overcome pesticide resistance

Abstract

Scientists have documented insecticide resistance in more than 580 insect species since the 1940s, leading to increasing concerns that this loss of effectiveness will threaten both public health and food security. But a new study suggests that boronic acids that target the enzymes that pests use to counteract insecticides may act synergistically with the insecticides to overcome resistance (Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A. 2019, DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1909130116). The researchers combined computational and experimental techniques and found that using a boronic acid in conjunction with a traditional insecticide increased the effectiveness of several common insecticides up to 16-fold. They think that using their newly identified synergists could decrease pesticide use by 90%. Organophosphates and carbamates, two of the most widely used classes of insecticides, kill insects by inhibiting a key enzyme, acetylcholinesterase. However, more than 50 insect species have developed resistance to this mode of action through ...