Developing a Feeding Assay System for Evaluating the Insecticidal Effect of Phytochemicals on Helicoverpa armigera

This study is conducted to develop a simple and cost-effective feeding assay method for evaluating the effect of various natural molecules, including phytochemicals for their antifeedant and insecticidal properties against thieving insects, and identified potential molecules from these assay can be evaluated in field condition for pest management. Multiple assays have been developed to evaluate the effect of synthetic and natural molecules on insect feeding, growth, development, and behavior, further assays have been designed, such as dip case tool, diet covering assay, contact assay, droplet feeding assay, choice feeding assay, and lip dish test for insecticide evaluation, Maintaining uniform experimental conditions, addressing issues, like infection and cannibalism, ensuring even phytochemical distribution in larval diet, tracking, feeding behavior accurately, and determining optimal phytochemical concentrations post challenges, batch variation, and experimental design complexities must be managed. Additionally, transitioning from the lab assist to the field application, considering formulation and scalability is demanding.

In the obligatory feeding assay, a large number of molecules can be tested simultaneously with a large number of insect sample sizes. The advantage of this feeding assay is that the test compound is mixed with an artificial diet, thus we have control over diet composition, which provides robust and reproducible results.