ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Plant Sci.
Sec. Plant Pathogen Interactions
This article is part of the Research TopicMolecular Interactions Between Biopesticides, Plant Volatiles, Essential Oils, and Target OrganismsView all articles
Biotoxicity of essential oil of Eucalyptus citriodora Hook (Myrtaceae) to dust mites
Provisionally accepted
Haiming Cai1Pusong Xie1Xu Zhang1Zhibin Lin1Zhimin Xu1Shuting Chen1Peiyao Ran1
Komivi Senyo Akutse2,3Shanshan Li4Huiquan Lin1Ziyi Wu5,6
Yongwen Lin7*- 1Zhangzhou Affiliated Hospital of Fujian Medical University, Zhangzhou, China
- 2International Centre of Insect Physiology and Ecology, Nairobi, Kenya
- 3North-West University Unit for Environmental Sciences and Management, Potchefstroom, South Africa
- 4Fujian Academy of Agricultural Sciences Institute of Subtropical Agriculture, Zhangzhou, China
- 5Fujian Agriculture and Forestry University, Fuzhou, China
- 6Fujian Zhanglong Group Co., Ltd., Fujian, China
- 7Zhangzhou Institute of Technology College of Food and Biological Engineering, Zhangzhou, China
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Dust mites are a prevalent indoor allergen contributing to respiratory diseases like allergic rhinitis and asthma. Eucalyptus citriodora essential oil, known for its balsamic odor and repellent effects on various pests, has been scantily investigated for its impacts on dust mites. The chemical composition of the essential oil and its head-space extracted from E. citriodora was determined using gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS). The toxicity of the oil and its compounds were assessed through contact-fumigant and vapour-phase mortality bioassays. Repellent effects were evaluated using a fabric-contact assay. Data were analyzed using probit regression to determine LC50 values. The essential oil contained seven main compounds, and citronellal, citronellol, and citronellyl acetate were the most abundant in the oil's volatile, accounting for a total of 88.22%. Citronellal exhibited the highest toxicity, and the essential oil itself showed strong toxicity with the LC50 of 63.94 and 84.53 μL/cm2 against Dermatophagoides pteronyssinus, 60.72 and 75.88 μL/cm2 against Dermatophagoides farinae, respectively. In vapour-phase assays, citronellal and ethyl phenylacetate caused 100% mortality. Citronellol had the highest repellent effect, and the essential oil, 1,8-cineole, and citronellyl acetate also showed significant repellency rates. E. citriodora essential oil and its compounds, particularly citronellal and citronellol, showed high potential for effective dust mite control due to their natural origin, strong toxicity and repellency impacts. Thus, E. citriodora essential oil is a natural, eco-friendly alternative to synthetic acaricides, providing a scientific basis for the control of indoor dust mite allergies.
Keywords: Citronellol, Dermatophagoides pteronyssinus, Dermatophagoides farinae, Toxicity, Repellency, environmental control
Received: 23 Sep 2025; Accepted: 17 Nov 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Cai, Xie, Zhang, Lin, Xu, Chen, Ran, Akutse, Li, Lin, Wu and Lin. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Yongwen Lin, 18605062536@126.com
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