Reduction of parathion residue on celery

Abstract

We have seen in the past 20 years the rapid growth and expansion in the use of chemicals in the control of insect pests of man and animals and in weed control. Their use is an absolute necessity if we are to continue to attempt to meet the food needs of our time and the daily increasing needs with increasing population. Pesticides, as necessary as we believe they are, provide us with the now well-known concomitant complex problem of residues. The goal toward which we aspire, of course, is that of a pesticide which will perform its work and then disappear entirely in its toxic form from the environment so that no residue problem will exist. One of the more difficult areas of pesticide research is that of removing from a particular commodity any toxic residue, altering the commodity in as small a way as possible. This is not an unexpected difficulty since most pesticide formulations emphasize broad contact and adherence to the sprayed or dusted object for best possible pest control. The particular interest in the research reported here is the attempted removal of parathion from mature celery. Some work was also done with escarole and lettuce which will also be reported.