Active volatiles and the odorant receptors underlying rosemary repellency to the tomato leafminer Tuta absoluta.

Authors

Jia-Hang Wei, Xuan-Pu Luan, Ji-Xiang Wang, Ying Li, Zheng Dai, Guan-Jun Fu, Kai-Yun Fu, Wen-Chao Guo, Qi Yan, Shuang-Lin Dong, Jin Zhang

Published in

Pest management science. Jul 06, 2026. Epub Jul 06, 2026.

Abstract

The tomato leafminer Tuta absoluta is a highly invasive quarantine pest that has spread from South America to numerous countries worldwide, posing a severe threat to solanaceous crops, particularly the tomato industry. Management of T. absoluta has primarily focused on application of insecticides, natural enemies and attractants, with limited research on repellent development.
We reported two volatile compounds (nonanal and geraniol) that display high repellent efficacy against mated female T. absoluta. First, six species of repellent plants were assessed, showing that the rosemary Rosmarinus officinalis and the mugwort Artemisia argyi were significantly repellent to T. absoluta. Further gas chromatography-electroantennographic detection assay identified seven active volatiles, including α-pinene, β-linalool, terpinene, nonanal, geraniol, 2-methylnaphthalene, and cis-verbanol. Of these volatiles, nonanal and geraniol were further confirmed as major repellents to mated females by behavioral assays. To explore the molecular mechanisms underlying the perception of the repellents, three candidate odorant receptors (ORs) (TabsOR19, TabsOR49, and TabsOR24) were obtained by phylogenetic analysis, and the first two ORs were confirmed to be sensitive to nonanal via the HEK293 cell expression system. Finally, key amino acid residues were predicted by molecular docking as Asn292 and Gln321 in TabsOR19, and His84 and Thr206 in TabsOR49.
Our study identified two repellent compounds and two ORs for the repellent nonanal, providing an important basis for the development of push-pull management strategies in T. absoluta. © 2026 Society of Chemical Industry.

PMID:
42410736
Bibliographic data and abstract were imported from PubMed on 07 Jul 2026.

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