Insects Talk on the Plant-Phone

by Jordan Yerman | April 27, 2008 at 11:16 am
306 views | 5 Recommendations | 1 comment

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Yeah, my new phone is pretty cool, and it doesn't even need to be charged. However, it requires solar power. And soil.
Dutch ecologist Roxina Soler and her colleagues have discovered that subterranean and aboveground herbivorous insects can communicate with each other by using plants as telephones. Subterranean insects issue chemical warning signals via the leaves of the plant. This way, aboveground insects are alerted that the plant is already ‘occupied’.
Via the 'green telephone lines', subterranean insects can also communicate with a third party, namely the natural enemy of caterpillars. Parasitic wasps lay their eggs inside aboveground insects. The wasps also benefit from the volatile signals emitted by the leaves, as these reveal where they can find a good host for their eggs. The communication between subterranean and aboveground insects has only been studied in a few systems. It is still not clear how widespread this phenomenon is.
This article is an official candidate for "coolest thing I've read all day".

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Beaulieu
Beaulieu
flagged this story as Good Stuff

at 03:03 on April 28th, 2008

jordan, I like this story. It's good stuff. Something different too.

This story was created over 3 months ago, the comment thread is now closed.

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