The term allelopathy is from the Greek-derived compounds
allelo and pathy (meaning “mutual harm” or “suffering”)
and was first used in 1937 by Austrian scientist Hans
Molisch in the book Der Einfluss einer Pflanze auf die
andere - Allelopathie (The Effect of Plants on Each Other)
(Willis 2010). First widely studied in forestry systems, allelopathy
can affect many aspects of plant ecology, including
occurrence, growth, plant succession, the structure of plant
communities, dominance, diversity, and plant productivity.
Initially, many of the forestry species evaluated had negative
allelopathic effects on food and fodder crops, but in
the 1980s research was begun to identify species that had
beneficial, neutral, or selective effects on companion crop
plants (Table 1). Early research grew out of observations
of poor regeneration of forest species, crop damage, yield
reductions, replant problems for tree crops, occurrence of
weed-free zones, and other related changes in vegetation