Maintenance of residual activity of Bt toxin by using natural and synthetic dyes: a novel approach for sustainable mosquito vector control

<div><p>Mosquito control protein from <i>Bacillus thuringiensis</i> gets inactivated with exposure to sunlight. To address this issue, the potential of synthetic and natural dye was investigated as sunlight protectants. Bt SV2 in absence of dyes when exposed to sunlight showed reduced effectiveness against the fourth instars of mosquito larvae. Whereas acriflavin, congo red and violacein were able to maintain 86.4%, 91.6% and 82.2% mosquito larvicidal efficacy of Bt SV2 against IVth instars larvae of <i>Anopheles stephensi</i> Meigen after exposure to sunlight. Similarly, beetroot dye, acriflavin, congo red and violacein maintained 98.4%, 97.1%, 90.8% and 70.7% larvicidal activities against <i>Aedes aegypti</i> Linnaeus after sunlight exposure. Prodigiosin was found to be the best photo-protectant by simultaneously protecting and enhancing Bt activity by 6.16% and 22.16% against <i>A. stephensi</i> and <i>A. aegypti</i>, respectively. Combination of dyes with Bt formulations can be a good strategy for mosquito control programmes in tropical and sub-tropical regions.</p>