Preface
Molecular Action of Insecticides on Ion Channels Downloaded from pubs.acs.org by 178.57.67.216 on 09/23/18. For personal use only.
INSECTICIDES H A V E B E E N T H E B O O N and the bane of human societies.
Their use has resulted in the most plentiful, least expensive, and most secure food source thus far produced by our agrarian efforts. As with all simplistic, directed approaches, the use of insecticides has had farreaching and, in most cases, unforeseen environmental impacts. Nevertheless, it is unlikely that in the near future the quality or quantity of foodstuff can be maintained in the absence of pesticidal chemicals, par ticularly insecticides. Thus, our efforts as pesticide scientists should be focused on research approaches that will result in the availability of novel pesticide products that have been evaluated in terms of what we have learned from past faults in pesticide design and unmanaged overuse. Molecular biological approaches have provided the means to funda mentally change the way in which pesticidal chemicals are discovered and used. Technical knowledge for the production of genetically engineered crop plants and biotechnological pest control strategies already exist and soon will become economically feasible. Because the large majority of currently used insecticides are neurotoxic and many are directed toxicologically to ion-channel disruption, an extensive database is currently available for assessment. Thus, the most enduring contribution of insecti cides such as D D T and the cyclodienes may be in providing well-studied models to assess the advantages and disadvantages of new molecular tech nologies. It is an appropriate time to assess the impact that these molec ular approaches have had on pest control and to evaluate the future of molecular pesticide science. This scenario provided the idealistic focus for the organization of an A C S symposium entitled "Molecular Action and Pharmacology of Insecti cides on Ion Channels", upon which this book is based. Topics were chosen principally in terms of their contemporary relevance to insect pest control and concentrated on those aspects in which a molecular under standing of insecticide action was being actively researched. Chapters were then requested from researchers and scholars drawn equally from academia and industry. These researchers are leading experts in their chosen areas of study and present a truly international group from Canada, Israel, Japan, the United Kingdom, and the United States. This book is divided into three sections, each concerned with the action of insecticides on a major ion-channel family: voltage-sensitive channels, ligand-gated channels, and biopesticide-induced channels. ix
Presented in this volume are recent advances in how we envision molecu lar binding sites of insecticides on ion channels and molecular alterations of these sites that result in site-insensitive resistance mechanisms. Addi tionally, new receptor-ion channels and mosaic receptor organizations are described as novel sites of insecticide action and perhaps as means of genetically managing the development of insecticide resistances in the future. I thank the authors for their presentations in the symposium and for their contributed chapters that encompass this volume. In particular, I extend my deepest appreciation to the many expert colleagues who pro vided helpful and necessary critical reviews. I thank Anne Wilson of A C S Books for all her help, suggestions, and encouragement; and Margaret Malone, Amity Lee-Bradley, and Julia Connelly of the Department of Entomology, University of Massachusetts, for endless organizational and editorial concerns. Their efforts and the generous financial support of the Division of Agrochemicals of the American Chemical Society; F M C Corporation; Ciba-Geigy Corporation; Miles, Inc.; Mycogen Corporation; N O R - A M Chemical Corporation; Nissan Chemicals of America Corpora tion; and Rollins, Inc., made this book possible. J.
MARSHALL
CLARK
Department of Entomology University of Massachusetts Amherst, MA 01003 January 17, 1995
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