NSERC Industrial Research Chair in Multimodal Animal Communication Ecology

广泛使用常规化学农药的时代已经结束。公众对有毒农药持续增长的使用感到担忧，这促使监管机构淘汰或限制农药的使用。这反过来又导致许多害虫死灰复燃，而另一些害虫继续袭击粮食、纤维和人，严重影响我们的健康和以自然资源为基础的经济。迫切需要改进害虫防治方法和化学农药的替代品。工业研究主席的更新建议是关于其中的一些替代方案：昆虫（和一些脊椎动物）利用多模式觅食线索或交流信号来定位资源和相互交流。重点是发现复杂、多模态和多成分的刺激，因为越来越多的证据表明，动物整合不同类型的信息。发现新的视觉、符号化学、声音、红外、生物磁性和静电觅食线索和通信信号，以及它们之间的协同效应，将有助于生产更有效的诱饵或驱虫剂，并将促进制定针对特定目标的虫害防治新策略，从而：(1)通过管理病媒昆虫和减少接触有毒杀虫剂来改善人类健康；(2)消除农药残留，提高食品质量；(3)减少病虫害影响，提高作物产量和品级；(4)通过综合策略降低病虫害防治成本；(5)通过保护益虫来保护生物多样性。

The era of widespread use of conventional chemical pesticides has ended. Public concern over continued and growing use of toxic pesticides has prompted regulatory agencies to eliminate pesticides or restrict their use. This, in turn, has lead to the resurgence of many pests, while others continue their assault on food, fiber and people, severely affecting our health and natural resource-based economy. Improved pest control methods and alternatives to chemical pesticides are urgently needed. The renewal proposal of the Industrial Research Chair is about some of those alternatives: multimodal foraging cues or communication signals insects (and some vertebrates) utilize to locate resources and to communicate among themselves. The emphasis is on the discovery of complex, multimodal and multicomponent stimuli because increasing evidence indicates that animals integrate diverse types of information. The discovery of novel visual, semiochemical, sonic, infrared, biomagnetic, and electrostatic foraging cues and communication signals, and synergistic effects between them, would allow the production of more effective baits or repellents, and would facilitate the development of new tactics for target-specific pest control, thereby: (1) improving human health through management of disease-vectoring insects and through reduced exposure to toxic insecticides; (2) improving food quality through elimination of insecticide residue; (3) increasing crop yield and grade through reduced pest impact; (4) reducing costs for pest control through integrated tactics; and (5) preserving biodiversity through conservation of beneficial insects.