Abstract |
Natural Enemy Risk Assessment (NERISK) is a computer-aided decision-support system designed to assist the user in examining the potential risks of pesticides to arthropod natural enemies (i.e., predators and parasitoids) in agricultural systems. It is a tool that helps to organize, store, and recall large amounts of information and make it readily available to even novice users. It is also a mechanism to integrate diverse information sources, particularly databases, simulation models, and expert opinions, and to provide quantitative estimates of pesticide risk based on these sources. NERISK is based on a 'shell' expert system called RECOG, and was designed and developed by a team workers at Oregon State University (Messing et al, 1989). |