ABSTRACT
Pesticides (from Latin pestis = plague, monster + caedere = to kill) are toxic chemical compounds used for the protection of agriculturally valuable plants against the attack of various growth retarders (weeds, parasites, insects, microorganisms). In principle, plants, especially the wild ones, have acquired an ability to defend themselves in the life-and-death struggle, synthesizing compounds, killing or at least depressing the growth of the surrounding plants and detrimental insects and microorganisms, and even harming herbivorous animals. For example, phytoalexins are antimicrobial substances synthesized by plants de novo that accumulate rapidly at the areas of incompatible pathogen infection (Ahuja et al., 2012). Cultivated plants have either partially lost this ability or it has weakened.
