Examining the chemicals involved in insect mating

It's almost Valentine's Day, and love is in the air. Or in the waxy coating on your skin, if you are a vinegar fly. That's where flies encounter pheromones that play an important role in regulating sexual attraction.

Food odor enhances male flies' attractiveness

Vinegar odor boosts the perception of a male sex pheromone in the brain of unmated female Drosophila melanogaster flies, as a team of scientists from the Department of Evolutionary Neuroethology has now discovered. The researchers ...

The irresistible fragrance of dying vinegar flies

Markus Knaden and Bill Hansson, and their colleagues at the Department of Evolutionary Neuroethology, study ecologically relevant odors in the natural environment of insects, especially vinegar flies. In this new study they ...

Humidity increases odour perception in terrestrial hermit crabs

(Phys.org) -- Max Planck scientists have found out that the olfactory system in hermit crabs is still underdeveloped in comparison to that of vinegar flies. While flies have a very sensitive sense of smell and are able to ...

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