Noted Expert on Botanical Insecticides

Scores of people want to hear what Murray Isman has to say.

And on Wednesday night, Oct. 27, they can.

Murray Isman, a noted expert on botanical insecticides, will deliver the Thomas and Nina Leigh Distinguished Alumni Seminar in Entomology at 5 p.m., Wednesday, Oct. 27 in the Activities and Recreation Center (ARC) at UC Davis.

Isman, who received his doctorate in entomology from UC Davis in 1981, is now the dean of Land and Food Systems and professor of applied biology (entomology/toxicology) at the University of British Columbia.

He will speak on "Aromatherapy for Pest Management? Pesticides Based on Plant Essential Oils for Agriculture, Industry and as Consumer Products" at 5 p.m. in the ARC Ballroom. A social hour is set for 4 p.m.

His lecture, free and open to the public, will be webcast live and then archived on the UC Davis Department of entomology website.  There's also a buffet dinner at 6 p.m. for faculty, alumni, students and other friends of entomology. (Carol Nickles is taking reservations for the buffet dinner at cnickles@ucdavis.edu or (530) 754-8638. Deadline for reservations: Sunday, Oct. 24.)

Isman and his research team develop insecticides, miticides, fungicides and herbicides using various plant essential oils as the active ingredients. EcoSMART Technologies (Alpharetta, GA) sells products of this type for the agricultural, industrial and consumer markets in the United States. “We are developing improved agricultural pesticides through enhanced formulations and in mixture with other botanical products,” Isman said.

Collaborating with university and industrial partners, the Isman team previously investigated the development of botanical insecticides derived from the Indian neem tree (Azadirachta indica), from medicinal plants and timber species of southeast Asia and Central America, and from tall oil, a byproduct of the temperate zone pulp and paper industry.

The Isman team also investigates the behavioral and physiological effects of plant defensive chemicals in insects. “We have investigated the effects of mixtures of plant chemicals on insect feeding and on the development of resistance to botanical insecticides,” Isman said. “Studies have characterized habituation to feeding deterrents in caterpillars, the metabolism of plant defensive chemicals by herbivorous insects, and the pharmacokinetics and fate of plant chemicals in insects.”

Their work also involves developing non-toxic crop protection chemicals that mimic naturally occurring bioactive odorants and tastants--and that are relatively easily prepared from commodity chemicals. “Because host plant detection is essential to the larval and adult stages of moth species consequently leading to crop damage,” he said, “we are targeting this chemical communication system with aromatic odorants that interfere with larval feeding or the oviposition behavior of adult moths, without causing toxic effects to the insects." This is collaboration with professor Erika Plettner of Simon Fraser University, British Columbia.

The seminar memorializes cotton entomologist Thomas Frances Leigh (1923-1993) and his wife Nina Eremin Leigh (1929-2002). Tom Leigh was an international authority on the biology, ecology and management of arthropod pests affecting cotton production.