The role of oxygen in the toxicity of fumigants to insects

Abstract The toxicity of fumigants to insects is dependent on two distinct processes (1) uptake of the fumigant and (2) toxication. Both of these processes may be influenced by the ambient oxygen tension. The importance of oxygen is indicated or inferred in many reports in the extensive literature that has accumulated in fumigation research, particularly in vacuum fumigation. Relevant observations on the role of oxygen in fumigant toxicity are assembled here in order to give some coherence to our present knowledge of this subject. This review points out some of the anomalies that have been observed and different interpretations that have been made regarding the interaction of the insect with oxygen and the fumigant. Physiological functions of insects that are known to occur at different oxygen tensions are discussed and these are related, as far as possible, to observed toxicological responses to fumigants. Future lines of research that will increase our understanding of the role of oxygen in toxicity are indicated.

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