Development of Omics Tools for the Assessments of the Environmental Fate and Impact of Biocontrol Agents
Résumé
Biocontrol agents (BCAs) and biopesticides are emerging as alternatives to replace synthetic pesticides. This chapter focuses on the recent omics-based studies assessing BCAs and biopesticide risks. It introduces novel omics-based proxies aiming to improve (bio)pesticides risk assessment protocols. The assessment of the environmental impact consists of studying the effects of the examined product on non-target living species of the environment, as vertebrate and invertebrate animals, plants or microorganisms. The classic risk evaluation protocols dedicated to studying synthetic pesticides are so far used to assess BCAs and biopesticide risks. The omics discipline can be divided into four main subdisciplines: genomics, transcriptomics, proteomics and metabolomics. The chapter focuses on genomics- and metabolomics-based studies for pesticides, biopesticides and BCAs risks assessment, as most of the reported research works mainly lay on those two sub-disciplines.