Insect community driven by plant hormones
Tuesday, May 13, 2014 - 08:32
in Biology & Nature
Plants are not solitary, defenceless organisms but rather the centre of a vibrant community consisting of tens or even hundreds of insect species. Plants possess a wide range of defence mechanisms that are activated in response to attack by insects. This change in a plant in turn affects any insects that subsequently arrive on it, but also the natural enemies of herbivorous insects. Because the properties of plants change continuously and because insects react to the changes, an extremely dynamic community develops, on which the plants exert a critical influence. These findings by biologists from the Laboratory of Entomology at Wageningen University were recently published in the leading journal Annual Review of Plant Biology.