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Date: | Thu, 15 Mar 2007 06:41:06 -0400 |
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Very interesting article on a biological pesticide created to effectively
fight against aflatoxin in Georgia. -- Marilyn
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http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2004/06/040625084110.htm
Science Daily - Peanut farmers now have a biological pesticide for
protecting their crops from fungi that produce aflatoxin. A biological
pesticide developed by Agricultural Research Service scientists recently
received U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Section 3 registration.
Circle One Global, Inc. (COGI), of Cuthbert, Ga., the sole licensee of the
ARS treatment, will immediately begin producing the biopesticide, called
Afla-Guard, for use in 2004. The ideal time to inoculate peanut fields is
late June or early July.
ARS scientist Joe W. Dorner and colleagues at the agency's National Peanut
Research Laboratory in Dawson, Ga., made the biological treatment from
spores of a nontoxigenic strain of Aspergillus flavus that is applied to
barley kernels. The kernels are then applied to the soil beneath the plant
canopy, where the fungus colonizes the barley and establishes itself to
compete against toxigenic strains of A. flavus that are naturally present.
Other strains of A. flavus, as well as A. parasiticus, are the primary
producers of aflatoxin.
Afla-Guard, in field trials, reduced aflatoxin typically 70 to 90 percent
after the first application. Repeated applications in subsequent years
reduced aflatoxin by as much as 98 percent.
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