Host change alters toxic cocktail
Leaf beetles fascinate us because of their amazing variety of shapes and rich colouring. Their larvae, however, are dangerous plant pests. Larvae of the leaf beetle Chrysomela lapponica attack two different tree species: willow and birch. To fend off predator attacks, the beetle larvae produce toxic butyric acid esters or salicylaldehyde, whose precursors they ingest with their leafy food. Scientists of the Max Planck Institute for Chemical Ecology in Jena, Germany, now found that a fundamental change in the genome has emerged in beetles that have specialised on birch: The activity of the salicylaldehyde producing enzyme salicyl alcohol oxidase (SAO) is missing in these populations, whereas it is present in willow feeders. For birch beetles the loss of this enzyme and hereby the loss of salicylaldehyde is advantageous: the enzyme is not needed anymore because its substrate salicyl alcohol is only present in willow leaves, but not in birch. Birch...