Page 3 - Volume 3, Issue 2, July 2010
Basic HTML Version
© Benaki Phytopathological Institute
1
Chemistry Laboratory, Department of Science, Agri-
cultural University of Athens, 75 Iera Odos Str., GR-118
55 Athens, Greece
2
Laboratory of Agricultural Entomology, Department
Hellenic Plant Protection Journal
3:
33-56, 2010
REVIEW ARTICLE
Oviposition aggregation pheromone for
Culex
mosquitoes:
bioactivity and synthetic approaches
A.P. Mihou
1
and A.N. Michaelakis
2
Summary
Mosquitoes use chemical and physical
cues to detect water bodies. Female
Culex
mosqui-
toes deposit their eggs, in the form of egg rafts, on
the water surface. Some of these species form
a droplet at the apex of each egg in the egg
raft which affects the oviposition behaviour
of intraspecific gravid females. The main
volatile compound, present in the api-
cal droplets of the
Cx. quinquefascia-
tus
egg rafts, is the (–)-(5
R
,6
S
)-6-ace-
toxy-5-hexadecanolide, which acts
as an attractant to other gravid fe-
males (of the same species com-
plex) in order to oviposit nearby
the pheromone source. There has
been a plethora of biological ap-
proaches under laboratory, semi-
field and field conditions in order
to study the responses of gravid fe-
males. Additionally, since the gen-
eral structure and stereochemis-
try were confirmed, several synthet-
ic approaches have been developed,
not only for the natural pheromone
but also for the
erythro
enantiomers
and all four diastereoisomers of 6-ace-
toxy-5-hexadecanolide. The interest and
applications of natural and synthetic mole-
cules indicated that only the (–)-(5
R
,6
S
) form
was bioactive, while the other three diastereoi-
somers were not. This article reviews the various
bioassays developed and also focuses on the most
successful synthetic approaches published in liter-
ature.
Additional keywords
: Bioassays,
Culex pipiens,
mos-
quito, oviposition, pheromone, synthesis, 6-ace-
toxy-5-hexadecanolide
Figure 1.
The oviposition aggregation pheromone for
Culex
mosquitoes and the vector of the West Nile virus.
Culex quin-
quefasciatus
mosquito has landed on a human finger.
Source of figure:
of Entomology and Agricultural Zoology, Benaki Phy-
topathological Institute, 8 St. Delta Str., GR-145 61 Ki-
fissia (Athens), Greece
Corresponding author:
