Insects· 2026Q1
Sweet Fennel Essential Oil Repels Drosophila suzukii via an Orco-Mediated Pathway
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- Q1SCImago
- 2026year
Short summary
Sweet fennel essential oil and its main component, trans-anethole, strongly repel Drosophila suzukii adults, with repellency mediated by the Orco olfactory receptor pathway.
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Key points
- Sweet fennel essential oil exhibits strong, dose-dependent repellent activity against Drosophila suzukii adults.
- Trans-anethole is the main repellent compound in sweet fennel essential oil.
- Repellency of sweet fennel oil and trans-anethole is mediated by the Orco olfactory receptor pathway.
- Orco knockout flies showed abolished EAG responses and significantly reduced repellency to these compounds.
AI-generated from the title and abstract; the full text is not read.
Abstract
Essential oils are promising alternatives to conventional chemical pesticides due to their toxic, repellent or oviposition-deterrent effects against many kinds of pests. Sweet fennel essential oil is widely recognized for its pharmacological, antimicrobial, and acaricidal properties. Moreover, several studies have demonstrated its insecticidal and repellent activities against insects. In this study, we found that sweet fennel essential oil exhibited strong dose-dependent repellent activity in the dual-choice still-air assay and oviposition behavioral assays against Drosophila suzukii adults. Next, we confirmed that trans-anethole was the most abundant constituent in sweet fennel essential oil using GC-MS. In addition, the results of the behavioral assays indicated that trans-anethole displayed comparable repellency against D. suzukii. Furthermore, an Orco knockout homozygous strain (Orco−/−) was generated using CRISPR–Cas9 genome editing, and the EAG responses of Orco−/− flies to sweet fennel oil and trans-anethole were completely abolished. The repellency elicited by sweet fennel oil and trans-anethole were also dramatically reduced. Taken together, these laboratory results not only reveal that sweet fennel oil holds potential in pest management but also demonstrate that its repellency is mediated by the Orco pathway.
The authors' abstract, as published at the source. Insects, 2026 · DOI ↗
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Field: Insect Science
Insect ScienceAgricultural and Biological Sciences