INSECTICIDAL ROCAGLAMIDE DERIVATIVES FROM AGLAIA-DUPPEREANA

Twigs of Aglaia duppereana collected in Vietnam yielded the cyclopenta tetrahydrobenzofuran, rocaglamide, and also six of its congeners. Wher eas three of the isolated compounds were already known, four rocaglami de derivatives were new natural products. Elucidation of their structu res and absolute configurations is described. All the rocaglamide deri vatives isolated exhibited strong insecticidal activity towards neonat e larvae of the polyphagous pest insect Spodoptera littoralis when inc orporated into artificial diet. The LC(50) for rocaglamide, which was one of the most active compounds encountered in this study, was 0.9 pp m, identical to that of azadirachtin used as a positive control in fee ding experiments. Copyright (C) 1997 Elsevier Science Ltd.