Electrostatic Insect Repulsion, Capture, and Arc-Discharge Techniques for Physical Pest Management in Greenhouses

This article reviews the development of electrostatic apparatuses for controlling insect pests in greenhouses. The apparatuses control insects by repelling them, capturing them, and killing them by producing an arc discharge. The single-charged dipolar electric field screen (SD screen) repels insects due to insects’ inherent avoidance behavior toward entering the electric field produced. As this behavior is common to many insect pests, the SD screen effectively prevents many pests from entering a greenhouse. The double-charged dipolar electric field screen (DD screen) has a strong attractive force that captures insects entering its electric field. The DD screen is useful for capturing small insects that pass through a conventional insect net, and unique derivatives of this screen have been invented to trap various insect pests on-site in a greenhouse. An arc-discharge exposer was used as a soil cover to kill adult houseflies that emerged from underground pupae transferred along with cattle manure used for soil fertilization. The houseflies were subjected to arc discharge when they appeared at the soil surface. These apparatuses have the common characteristic of a simple structure, so ordinary workers can be encouraged to fabricate or modify them based on their own needs. This review provides an experimental basis for designing efficient physical measures for controlling insect pests in greenhouses.