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PLoS One

Title:		Changes in odor background affect the locomotory response to pheromone in moths
Author(s):		Party V; Hanot C; Busser DS; Rochat D; Renou M;
Address:		"UMR 1272 Physiologie de l'Insecte Signalisation et Communication, INRA, Versailles, France. vparty@live.fr"
Journal Title:		PLoS One
Year:		2013
Volume:		20130102
Issue:		1
Page Number:		e52897 -
DOI:		10.1371/journal.pone.0052897
ISSN/ISBN:		1932-6203 (Electronic) 1932-6203 (Linking)
Abstract:		"Many animals rely on chemical cues to recognize and locate a resource, and they must extract the relevant information from a complex and changing odor environment. For example, in moths, finding a mate is mediated by a sex pheromone, which is detected in a rich environment of volatile plant compounds. Here, we investigated the effects of a volatile plant background on the walking response of male Spodoptera littoralis to the female pheromone. Males were stimulated by combining pheromone with one of three plant compounds, and their walking paths were recorded with a locomotion compensator and analyzed. We found that the addition of certain volatile plant compounds disturbed the orientation toward the sex pheromone. The effect on locomotion was correlated with the capacity of the plant compound to antagonize pheromone detection by olfactory receptor neurons, suggesting a masking effect of the background over the pheromone signal. Moths were more sensitive to changes in background compared to a constant background, suggesting that a background odor also acts as a distracting stimulus. Our experiments show that the effects of odorant background on insect responses to chemical signals are complex and cannot be explained by a single mechanism"
Keywords:		"Animals Behavior, Animal/drug effects/physiology Electrophysiology Female Locomotion/drug effects Male Movement *Odorants Olfactory Receptor Neurons/drug effects/physiology Pheromones/*metabolism Sex Attractants/*metabolism *Sexual Behavior, Animal Smell/;"
Notes:		"MedlineParty, Virginie Hanot, Christophe Busser, Daniela Schmidt Rochat, Didier Renou, Michel eng 2013/01/10 PLoS One. 2013; 8(1):e52897. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0052897. Epub 2013 Jan 2"