Exploring the chemical ecology and development of nanoformulation carrying consortia of plant volatiles for tritrophic interaction and pest management in rice

Abstract

newline Rice (Oryza sativa L.) is one of the world s most important crops and has more newlinesignificance in country like India. High production of more than 104 million tonnes for newlinethe year 2021/22 is the target stated by the Government of Tamil Nadu to meet the newlineconsumers need. However, the major constraint in the achievement of increased newlineproduction is the stress created by biotic factors such as insect pests. Though, several newlineinsect pest management strategies are followed worldwide for rice ecosystem, enormous newlineuse of chemical insecticides for pest management had led to certain major problems like newlineincrease in the secondary pest attack, decrease in the population of natural enemies, newlinepesticide residue effect on the environment, etc. Hence, the awareness of ecological newlinesustainable methods like ecological engineering for the mitigation of biotic stress is newlinenecessary. Recently, herbivore induced plant volatiles are gaining more importance in newlinethis aspect due to its effect on the conservation of natural enemies in the ecosystem. newlineThe present study was aimed to develop an herbivore induced plant volatile based newlinepest management in the rice ecosystem. In order to achieve this, the study was formulated newlineto observe the varied occurrence of pest and natural enemies in the rice newlinelandraces/varieties, to determine the influential role of volatile compounds in the rice newlinevarieties/landraces for the occurrence of pest, to identify the compounds responsible for newlinetritrophic interaction, to develop a nanoformulation of the compound and to evaluate it newlineunder laboratory and field condition