This is far less an insult to mammals than it is to insects. Chemical messengers, such as acetylcholine, can indirectly stimulate or inhibit activity within a tissue type. The particular response depends on the receptor sites of the target tissue and the secondary messenger system invoked by that receptor. Mammals and even some other insect species have a greater proportion of muscarinergic receptors, and thus are less affected than those species with a higher proportion of nicotinergic receptors. This is a major breakthrough in selective specificity to target species.
Advantage is available only by veterinary prescription.
Frontline belongs to a rather unique class of insecticides called ion channel blockers. A nerve impulse is no more than an electric current that travels down the length of a nerve cell. Between this cell and other cells is a small space called a nerve synapse that separate the nerve cells. In order for the current to jump this synaptic junction, the electric signals causes the release of neurotransmitters, thus changing the electrical signal into a chemical one. These chemical messengers travel across the synapse between nerve cells and bind to their own specific receptors that change the permeability of the cell membrane to various chemical ions.