Trees with fungal infections produce odours that attract bark beetles, which burrow into the bark and can devastate entire forests
that wasn’t beneficial to the beetle – and which produced different chemical compounds – the insects weren’t attracted to the wood. “The beetles have evolved to sense the beneficial fungus… and avoid or ignore the ones that are not good for them,” says Kandasamy.
A more thorough investigation of which fungi produce chemicals that are attractive to the beetles would have strengthened the study, saysis particularly special. It may be a natural function of any member of the microbial soup that grows inside a dead tree.” The researchers are optimistic that pinpointing bark beetle-attracting compounds could lead to more effective baiting efforts. Currently, researchers use a cocktail of attractive pheromones to lure the beetles into a trap en mass, but the method “hasn’t been that successful in the cycle of outbreaks that have started in the last 10 years”, says Gershenzon. He hopes adding these fungi-related compounds to traps could boost their effectiveness.
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