Abstract
Pests not only attack field crops during the growing season, but also damage grains and other food products stored in granaries. Modified or controlled atmospheres (MAs or CAs) with higher or lower concentrations of atmospheric gases, mainly oxygen (O2), carbon dioxide (CO2), ozone (O3), and nitric oxide (NO), provide a cost-effective method to kill target pests and protect stored products. In this review, the most recent discoveries in the field of MAs are discussed, with a focus on pest control as well as current MA technologies. Although MAs have been used for more than 30 years in pest control and play a role in storage pest management, the specific mechanisms by which insects are affected by and adapt to low O2 (hypoxia) and high carbon CO2 (hypercapnia) are not completely understood. Insect tolerance to hypoxia/anoxia and hypercapnia involves a decrease in aerobic metabolism, including decreased NADPH enzyme activity, and subsequently, decreases in glutathione production and catalase, superoxide dismutase, glutathione-S-transferase, and glutathione peroxidase activities, as well as increases in carboxyl esterase and phosphatase activities. In addition, hypoxia induces energy and nutrient production, and in adapted insects, glycolysis and pyruvate carboxylase fluxes are downregulated, accompanied with O2 consumption and acetate production. Consequently, genes encoding various signal transduction pathway components, including epidermal growth factor, insulin, Notch, and Toll/Imd signaling, are downregulated. We review the changes in insect energy and nutrient sources, metabolic enzymes, and molecular pathways in response to modified O2, CO2, NO, and O3 concentrations, as well as the role of MAs in pest control. This knowledge will be useful for applying MAs in combination with temperature control for pest control in stored food products.
Highlights
Herbivorous insects attack field crops during the growing season, and damage grains stored in granaries (Weaver and Petroff, 2005; Sadeghi et al, 2011)
Tribolium confusum du Val and Ephestia kuehniella Zeller showed different susceptibilities to O3 reflush treatment at 30-min intervals for 5 h at different developmental stages, and T. confusum was more tolerant than E. kuehniella at all developmental stages (Isikber and Oztekin, 2009). These findings indicate that various MA combinations are available to create hypoxia and/or hypercapnia, and different MA combinations can be used for different pests in stored products
Trehalose plays an important role in protecting flies against anoxia injury, and induction of Trehalose-6-phosphate synthase (TPS) increased tolerance to anoxia by reducing anoxia-induced protein aggregation (Tang et al, 2018)
Summary
Herbivorous insects attack field crops during the growing season, and damage grains stored in granaries (Weaver and Petroff, 2005; Sadeghi et al, 2011). MA treatments usually involve either low O2 (0–11.5 kPa) or high CO2 (18–90 kPa) and are applied with augmented-temperature sterilization to combat pests in stored products. These results indicate that an MA combined with higher temperature is an effective method for pest control in stored products in future.
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