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Old ingredients for a new recipe? Neem cake, a low-cost botanical by-product in the fight against mosquito-borne diseases

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Abstract

Mosquitoes (Diptera: Culicidae) represent an important threat to millions of people worldwide, since they act as vectors for important pathogens, such as malaria, yellow fever, dengue and West Nile. Control programmes mainly rely on chemical treatments against larvae, indoor residual spraying and insecticide-treated bed nets. In recent years, huge efforts have been carried out to propose new eco-friendly alternatives, with a special focus on the evaluation of plant-borne mosquitocidal compounds. Major examples are neem-based products (Azadirachta indica A. Juss, Meliaceae) that have been proven as really effective against a huge range of pests of medical and veterinary importance, including mosquitoes. Recent research highlighted that neem cake, a cheap by-product from neem oil extraction, is an important source of mosquitocidal metabolites. In this review, we examined (i) the latest achievements about neem cake metabolomics with special reference to nor-terpenoid and related content; (ii) the neem cake ovicidal, larvicidal and pupicidal toxicity against Aedes, Anopheles and Culex mosquito vectors; (iii) its non-target effects against vertebrates; and (iv) its oviposition deterrence effects on mosquito females. Overall, neem cake can be proposed as an eco-friendly and low-cost source of chemicals to build newer and safer control tools against mosquito vectors.

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Acknowledgments

We would like to thank Professor Heinz Mehlhorn and the anonymous reviewers for their comments on an earlier version of this review. We gratefully  acknowledge the contributions of our co-authors to the original work. Giovanni Benelli is supported by a MIS. 124 MODOLIVI Grant. Funds were also provided by the Italian Ministry of Education, University and Research (MIUR). Funders had no role in the study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Agriculture, Food and Environment, University of Pisa, Via del Borghetto 80, 56124, Pisa, Italy

    Giovanni Benelli & Barbara Conti

  2. Division of Entomology, Department of Zoology, School of Life Sciences, Bharathiar University, Coimbatore, Tamil Nadu, 641046, India

    Kadarkarai Murugan, Chellasamy Panneerselvam & Pari Madhiyazhagan

  3. Department of Environmental Biology, University Sapienza of Rome, Piazzale Aldo Moro 5, 00185, Rome, Italy

    Marcello Nicoletti

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  1. Giovanni Benelli
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  2. Kadarkarai Murugan
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  3. Chellasamy Panneerselvam
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  4. Pari Madhiyazhagan
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  5. Barbara Conti
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  6. Marcello Nicoletti
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Correspondence to Giovanni Benelli.

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Benelli, G., Murugan, K., Panneerselvam, C. et al. Old ingredients for a new recipe? Neem cake, a low-cost botanical by-product in the fight against mosquito-borne diseases. Parasitol Res 114, 391–397 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00436-014-4286-x

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