Acting Pheromones:Pheromoneresources

There are three types of  acting pheromones reported in the literature. One is

1. Acting pheromone (Butler.1957; Butler et al.,1962; Brian and  Rigby,1978;Hoover  et al.,2003; Leoncini et al.,2004; Hoover  et al.,2005;).
2. Olfactory acting pheromones (Karlson and  Butenandt,1959).
3. Gustatory pheromones (Karlson and  Butenandt,1959; Shorey, 1973).

Is it a fact the  above three  are the same or  not?

The first one suppress ovary activation in sensitive workers of Honey bees (Lipiñski, 2006).

The second one stimulate the mounting activity and ejaculatory behaviour of male rhesus monkeys through   the  vaginal secretions contain “copulins” of ovariectomized, oestrogen-treated female (Curtis et al.,1971).

It appears to be different.

Let us understand now  in detail.

Acting pheromone, which can suppress ovary activation in sensitive workers of Honey bee Apis mellifera (Lipiñski, 2006). In the ant Camponotus floridanus, a signal is located on queen-laid eggs. Thus, the eggs seem to inform the nestmates about the queen's presence, which induces workers to refrain from reproducing. Queen- and worker-laid eggs differ in their surface hydrocarbons in a way similar to the way fertile queens differ from workers in the composition of their cuticular hydrocarbons,  when transferred from the queen cuticle to worker-laid eggs, the destruction of those eggs was significantly mitigated (Endler et al.,2004).   Gueen mandibular gland pheromone with its main component, 9 oxodecenoic acid, causes workers to refrain from reproducing (Hoover  et al.,2003; Butler et al.,1962; Butler.1957 ). The amounts of the two most biologically active acid components of the QMP (i.e. 9-keto-2(E)-decenoic acid, 9-ODA and 9-hydroxy-2(E)-decenoic acid, 9-HDA) are important and there was also no significant difference in the ovary activation of anarchistic workers according to queen genotype as reported by Hoover  et al.(2005). Ethyl oleate is new primer pheromone released by older forager bees to slow the maturing of nurse bees (Leoncini et al.,2004).

Another possibility of indirect communication is the use of eggs as a vehicle to distribute a queen signal throughout the colony, which has been suggested for the ant Myrmica rubra, where queen-produced egg clusters had some inhibitory effect on worker ovarian development (Brian and  Rigby,1978).

The sympatric Japanese honeybee Apis cerana japonica (Hymenoptera: Apidae) can detect the hornet marking pheromone, and responds by increasing the number of defenders at the nest entrance. When an invading hornet is captured by a defending bee, more than 500 other bees quickly engulf the hornet in a ball which contains isoamyl acetate (Masato Ono et al.,1995).

The increasing quantity of 2-heptanone from 0.1 μl at emergence to 7 μl in foraging bees, is strictly correlated with hypertrophy of the mitochondria, which are engaged in the production of heterogeneous bodies. Similar age-dependent changes of 2-heptanone levels were found in mandibular glands of workers from docile and aggressive colonies and the amount of 2-heptanone in foraging bees of the two groups was alike  (Vallet et al.,1991).

Now let us see about the

Olfactory acting pheromones:

All the sex pheromones which are released by one sex  and received by the opposite sex through  chemoreceptors of antennae are Olfactory acting pheromones (Karlson and  Butenandt,1959).

Vaginal secretions of ovariectomized, oestrogen-treated female rhesus monkeys contain “copulins” that stimulate the mounting activity and ejaculatory behaviour of male rhesus monkeys.  The behavioural effects of these secretions were blocked in males made temporarily anosmic, but became apparent when olfactory acuity had been restored; they thus seem to possess the properties of olfactorily acting pheromones (Curtis et al.,1971).

Olfactory stimulants in the primates can produce mounting, masturbation and ejaculation, increase grooming behaviour and reduce aggression  (Eric Barrington Keverne,1976).

Gustatory pheromones

In Drosophila, as in many dipterans, most known sex pheromones are cuticular hydrocarbons  (Wicker-Thomas, 2007) which are detected by the olfactory and/or gustatory sensory systems. As in other insects, olfactory and gustatory receptors in Drosophila are found in neurons housed in various sensory appendages (Dethier, 1976). These neurons can perceive chemical stimuli, transduce them and convey the corresponding information to the central  nervous system, which in turn will trigger the appropriate behavioural response (Wang et al., 2004). In Drosophila melanogaster, gustatory receptors and gustatory receptor neurons (GRNs) are relatively well characterized (Hiroi et al., 2004; Thorne et al., 2004; Marella et al., 2006; Moon et al., 2006; Dahanukar et al.,2007; Jiao et al., 2007; Slone et al. 2007; Kent and  Robertson, 2009). Courtship latency and first target chosen are relevant to chemoperception prior  to the first gustatory contact whereas the other parameters provide a measure of the tester  male behaviour after his first gustatory contact (Claude Everaerts et al.,2010 ). compounds are mainly perceived with  the gustatory organs located on the fore tarsi and mouthparts (Stocker, 1994; Shanbhag et al., 2001; Boll and  Noll, 2002; Lacaille et al., 2007).

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Claude Everaerts, Fabien Lacaille, Jean-Fran¸Cois Ferveur.2010.Is mate choice in Drosophila males guided by olfactory or gustatory pheromones ?. Animal Behaviour, 79(5):1135-1146.

Curtis, R.F., Ballantine, J.A., Keverne, E.B., Bonsall,R.W., Michael,R.P.1971. Identification of primate sexual pheromones and the properties of synthetic attractants. Nature.,232: 396-398.

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Endler, A., Liebig, J., Schmitt, T., Parker, J. E., Jones, G. R., Schreier, P., and  Hölldobler, B. 2004. Surface hydrocarbons of queen eggs regulate worker reproduction in a social insect. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 101(9):2945-2950.

Eric Barrington Keverne.1976. Sex attractants in primates, J. Soc. Cosmet. Chem. 27: 257-269.

Hara, T. J. 1994. The diversity of chemical stimulation in fish olfaction and gustation. Reviews in Fish Biology and Fisheries, 4(1):1-35.

Hiroi, M., Meunier, N. , Marion-Poll, F. & Tanimura, T. 2004. Two antagonistic gustatory  receptor neurons responding to sweet-salty and bitter taste in Drosophila. Journal of  Neurobiology, 61:333-342.

Hoover,  S.E.R., B.P. Oldroyd, T.C. Wossler  and M.L. Winston.2005. Anarchistic queen honey bees have normal queen mandibular pheromones, Insect. Soc. 52:6–10.

Hoover, S. E. R., Keeling, C. I., Winston, M. L. & Slessor, K. N. 2003. The effect of queen pheromones on worker honey bee ovary development, Naturwissenschaften, 90:477–480.

Jiao, Y., Moon, S. J. and  Montell, C. 2007. A Drosophila gustatory receptor required for the responses to sucrose, glucose, and maltose identified by mRNA tagging. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, U.S.A.,104:14110-14115.

Karlson, P., & Butenandt, A. 1959. Pheromones (ectohormones) in insects. Annual review of entomology, 4(1):39-58.

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Lacaille, F., Hiroi, M., Twele, R. and  Inoshita, T. 2007 An inhibitory sex pheromone tastes bitter for Drosophila males. PLoS ONE, 2/8, e661, 1-7.

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Marella, S., Fischler, W., Kong, P., Asgarian, S., Rueckert, E. and  Scott, K.2006. Imaging taste responses in the fly brain reveals a functional map of taste category and behavior. Neuron, 49:285-295.

Masato Ono, Takeshi Igarashi, Eishi  Ohno and  Masami Sasaki. 1995. Unusual thermal defence by a honeybee against mass attack by hornets. Nature, 377:334-336.

Moon, S. J., Kottgen, M., Jiao, Y, Xu, H. and  Montell, C. 2006. A taste receptor required for  the caffeine response in vivo. Current Biology, 16:1812-1817.

Shanbhag, S., Park, S., Pikielny, C. W. and  Steinbrecht, R. A. 2001 Gustatory organs of Drosophila melanogaster: fine structure and expression of the putative odorant- binding protein PBPRP2. Cell and Tissue Research, 304, 423-437.

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Vallet,A., P.Cassier and  Y.Lensky.1991.Ontogeny of the fine structure of the mandibular glands of the honeybee (Apis mellifera L.) workers and the pheromonal activity of 2-heptanone,Journal of Insect Physiology,37(11):789-804.

Visual, olfactory, gustatory, acoustic 62 and/or tactile stimuli are exchanged by pairs of mature D. melanogaster flies (reviewed in 63 Greenspan & Ferveur, 2000)

Vogt, R. G. 2005. Molecular basis of pheromone detection in insects. Comprehensive insect physiology, biochemistry, pharmacology and molecular biology, 3:753-804.

Wang, Z. Singhvi, A. Kong, P. and Scott, K.2004. Taste representations in the Drosophila brain. Cell, 117:981-991.

Wicker-Thomas, C.2007. Pheromonal communication involved in courtship behavior in Diptera, Journal of Insect Physiology, 53:1089–1100.