Evaluation of a Push-Pull Strategy for Spotted-Wing Drosophila Management in Highbush Blueberry.

We evaluated a novel push-pull control strategy for protecting highbush blueberry, , against spotted-wing drosophila (SWD), . Methyl benzoate (MB) was used as the pushing agent and a previously tested SWD attractive blend of lure-scents was used as the pulling agent. MB dispensers (push) were hung in the canopy and lure-scent dispensers (pull) were hung in yellow jacket traps filled with soapy water around the blueberry bushes.

Adsorbent-SERS Technique for Determination of Plant VOCs from Live Cotton Plants and Dried Teas.

We developed a novel substrate for the collection of volatile organic compounds (VOCs) emitted from either living or dried plant material to be analyzed by surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy (SERS). We demonstrated that this substrate can be utilized to differentiate emissions from blends of three teas, and to differentiate emissions from healthy cotton plants versus caterpillar-infested cotton plants. The substrate we developed can adsorb VOCs in static headspace sampling environments, and VOCs naturally evaporated from three standards were successfully identified by our SERS substrate, showing its ability to differentiate three VOCs and to detect quantitative differences according to collection times.