SAGE Journals
Browse

A comparison of the persistence, toxicity, and exposure to high-volume natural plant-derived and synthetic pesticides

Posted on 2020-07-21 - 12:06

The immobility of plants exerted evolutionary selection pressures resulting in the production of thousands of chemical substances thought to function as pesticides against predation by insects and animals. More than 10,000 plant-derived compounds have been isolated with the existence of about 100,000 such compounds postulated. In 1990, Ames et al. reported that 99.99% by weight of the pesticides ingested in a normal human diet are derived from natural plant-based sources. This surprising result raised the question as to whether these natural plant pesticides were toxic to humans. These authors examined a relatively small subset of natural pesticides and determined that their tumorigenicity in rodent cancer bioassays was similar to synthetic pesticides. In this analysis, we used standard United States Environmental Protection Agency programs to estimate the toxicity (T.E.S.T. 4.2) and persistence (EPI Suite 4.1) of a series of high-volume synthetic and natural pesticides. On average, synthetic pesticides were more persistent in the environment than were natural pesticides. This result is consistent with cost, time, and logistical constraints under which farmers apply a limited number of applications of pesticides during a crop cycle. Synthetic and natural pesticides are predicted to possess toxicities including mutagenicity and developmental toxicity. Synthetic pesticides are less often mutagenic.

CITE THIS COLLECTION

DataCite
3 Biotech
3D Printing in Medicine
3D Research
3D-Printed Materials and Systems
4OR
AAPG Bulletin
AAPS Open
AAPS PharmSciTech
Abhandlungen aus dem Mathematischen Seminar der Universität Hamburg
ABI Technik (German)
Academic Medicine
Academic Pediatrics
Academic Psychiatry
Academic Questions
Academy of Management Discoveries
Academy of Management Journal
Academy of Management Learning and Education
Academy of Management Perspectives
Academy of Management Proceedings
Academy of Management Review
or
Select your citation style and then place your mouse over the citation text to select it.

SHARE

email
need help?