Exploration of teratogenic and genotoxic effects of fruit ripening retardant Alar (Daminozide) on model organism Drosophila melanogaster

Alar (Daminozide) is a plant growth regulator which is widely used as a fruit preservative for apple and mango to prevent pre-harvest fruit drop, promote color development and to delay excessive ripening. The aim of the present work was to demonstrate the effect of Alar on several life history traits, adult morphology, Hsp70 protein expression and in vivo DNA damage in the brain of the model organism Drosophila melanogaster. We assessed the life history and morphological traits including fecundity, developmental time, pupation height, egg-to-adult viability and mean wing length, body length, arista length and sternopleural bristle number of the emerging flies. The results showed a significant delay in the developmental milestones, increase in body length, wing length, arista length, a decrease in fecundity, pupal height and variation in sternopleural bristle number in the treated flies in comparison to the controls. Overexpression of Hsp70 protein suggests alar induced subcellular molecular stress and comet assay validates genotoxicity in the form of DNA damage in the treated larvae. Mutation screening experiment revealed induction of X lined lethal mutation.