Insects 'make phone calls' to each other through leaves

Dutch ecologist Roxina Soler and her colleagues discovered that grass-eating insects that live on the ground and on the ground can communicate with each other using plants like electricity. phone.

Illustrations of communication between grass-eating insects live on the ground and live on the ground.(Photo: Dutch scientific research organization)

The insects that live on the ground emit warning signals through the leaves of the plant. In this way, insects that live on the ground will be warned that the tree has been 'occupied'.

The insects that eat leaves on the ground prefer plants that have not been occupied by insects that live on the ground below. Live insects will emit chemical signals through the leaves of plants to warn insects living on the ground about their presence. The transmission of this information will help insects separated from each other in space to avoid each other so that they may not intentionally compete with a tree.

In recent years it has been discovered that different types of terrestrial insects grow slowly if they eat the same plants that the 'inhabitants' on the ground also take as food and vice versa. There appears to be a mechanism of development through natural selection that helps terrestrial insects and insects live under the ground to detect each other. This will avoid unnecessary competition.

Green phone line

Through 'green phone lines', insects that live below the ground can also communicate information with a third species, typically as natural enemies of caterpillars. The parasitic wasps will lay eggs in insects that live on the ground. Hornets also benefit from flexible signals emitted from leaves because these signals tell them where they can find a good host to spawn. The communication between terrestrial insects and underground living is not only studied in some systems. It is still unclear how this phenomenon spreads.

The study was conducted at the Dutch Institute of Ecology (NIOO-KNAW) with the participation of Roxina Soler, Jeffrey Harvey, Martijn Bezemer, Wim van der Putten and Louise Vet. This is also a research project funded by a project sponsored by the NWO Earth and Life Sciences Research Center's Freedom Contest.