The potential use of essential oils against mosquito larvae: A short review

The insecticidal activity of essential oils (EOs) on mosquito larvae has gained quite a lot of interest in recent scientific literature, and many articles envisage EOs as promising alternatives to conventional larvicides. However, the EOs described so far are not comparable in terms of efficacy with chemical or microbial larvicides. Moreover, for most EOs the low mammalian toxicity and the lack of environmental impacts have been claimed rather than tested. In industrialized countries, the availability of effective and environmental friendly microbial larvicides, will likely limit the EO-based products to very small market niches. Only in developing countries, where most aromatic plants are native, the full potential of botanical larvicides may be fully exploited. However, several research gaps remain to be filled before EOs could be considered as substitutes of conventional products.