Pheromone Production and Perception: From Genetics to Behaviors

Dear Colleagues,

“Musk” is not just a pleasant wood perfume or cologne, an enjoyable powerful fragrance for the use of our nose, it is also the land pheromone of male authentic Wild Central Asian Musk/Kasturi Real Deer, i.e. whitetail deer buck. In snakes, a molecule such as Sodephrin mediates male-female interaction and sex attractiveness. In the magnificent tree frog (Litora splendida), a sex recognition pheromone (Splendipherin) is produced in the paratoid and rostral glands of the male head. In apes and mandrills, various scent-gland secretions influence sex recognition, social status and inter-individual association. Like most mammals, odorant pheromones are crucial for primate reproduction and social behavior. While the concept of “human pheromones” remains rather enigmatic, pheromones and odor chemicals largely affect insect behavior and physiology. Aggregation signals for defense and/or migration, alarm pheromones, food trail chemicals, territorial (nest) marks, oviposition site selection pheromones and sexual odors are used by most of all insect species from the honeybee to the dark sword-grass moth, black cutworm, a severe pest on corn. Accordingly, behavioral, biochemical, genetic, molecular, neurobiological and physiological aspects of pheromone communication have been and remain extensively studied in insects. The resulting data have provided critical insights into the chemical mechanisms by which biosynthetic enzymes operate and even lead to the formulation of new principles and biotechnological applications of sex odor-receptor interactions. The ecological functions of pheromone lures such as disparlure and the evolution of moth pheromones are major research topics in fields that focus on the identification of pheromone components and their use in insect pest control, in applied entomology and in chemical ecology of animals in general. Although these are considered at the organismal level, we extend our studies to cells, genes, molecules and molecular interactions. The topic title in this multi-volume collection aims at collecting the results of modern research that seek to answer all the challenges, debates and questions that are currently posed in the field of pheromone production and perception (from genetics to behaviors) across the whole Animalia kingdom. It is rather extraordinary to think that ants, cockroaches and collembolan species use fatty acids as ancient chemical signals for avoiding predation and disease, whereas the male European corn borer moth, Ostrinia nubilalis, does elaborate loops when in close proximity to a seducing female. This behavior will then give way to the extrusion of small brush-like organs (hairpencils) from the belly and terminal part of the abdomen to release specific aphrodisiacs, namely a substance that bears information about species, strain, sex, age, mating history and/or individual status, and evokes female mate choice, a primordial event to sexual selection. As the Topic Editors of this Topic Collection “Pheromone Production and Perception: from genetics to behaviors”, we are anticipating submissions from the following aspects: (1) Molecular basis of pheromone-receptor interactions (2) Pheromonogenesis (pheromone biosynthetic pathways) (3) Pheromones in insect pest management (4) Identification of insect pheromones: chemical and behavioral evidence (5) Ecological, behavioral and molecular aspects of insect hydrocarbons (6) Pheromone-mediated intraspecific interactions (alarm signaling, mating, aggregation) (7) Pheromone-mediated interspecific interactions (animal interactions and emergence of territoriality, prey-predator interactions, symbiosis, commensalism, mutualism) (8) Olfaction: molecular mechanisms of pheromone detection (9) Odorant-binding proteins (OBPs), chemosensory proteins (CSPs), NPC2, intracellular transport of fatty acids, lipids and cholesterol, regulation of cell metabolism (10) Hormonal regulation of pheromone production (11) Genetic and molecular analyses of insect-plant interactions (12) Host plant finding by arthropods and worms (13) Semiochemistry of plant-insect interactions (14) Mechanisms of plant-microbes-insects three way interactions (15) Genetic basis of chemical communication in eusocial insects (16) Nestmate recognition in social insects (17) Chemistry of building-up dominance hierarchies in animals (18) Gut microbiota modulate insect communication and reproduction (19) Climate change and insect communication and reproduction (20) Pheromones, insecticides, hormesis

Prof. Dr. Jean-François Picimbon
Prof. Dr. François Verheggen
Dr. J.Joe Hull
Dr. Alejandro Rooney
Prof. Dr. Takeshi Sakurai
Prof. Dr. Takeshi Fujii
Prof. Dr. Klaus H. Hoffmann
Topic Editors