| heal.abstract |
Mosquitoes use chemical and physical cues to detect water bodies. Female Culex mosquitoes 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 apical droplets of the Cx. quinquefasciatus egg rafts, is the (-)-(5R,6S)-6-acetoxy-5-hexadecanolide, which acts as an attractant to other gravid females (of the same species complex) in order to oviposit nearby the pheromone source. There has been a plethora of biological approaches under laboratory, semifield and field conditions in order to study the responses of gravid females. Additionally, since the general structure and stereochemistry were confirmed, several synthetic approaches have been developed, not only for the natural pheromone but also for the erythro enantiomers and all four diastereoisomers of 6-acetoxy-5-hexadecanolide. The interest and applications of natural and synthetic molecules indicated that only the (-)-(5R,6S) form was bioactive, while the other three diastereoisomers were not. This article reviews the various bioassays developed and also focuses on the most successful synthetic approaches published in literature. © Benaki Phytopathological Institute. |
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