Find the aphid

By leaving the remains of their old exoskeletons, called 'exuviae', in and around their colonies, aphids gain some measure of protection from parasites. Research published in the open access journal BMC Evolutionary Biology has shown that parasitoid wasps are likely to attack the empty shells, resulting in a lower attack rate on their previous occupants – much like in the popular 'shell game' confidence trick.

Frédéric Muratori and his collaborators from the Université catholique de Louvain, Belgium, and McGill University, Canada, studied the insects in an effort to explain the aphids' tendency to leave exuviae around their colonies, behaviour the authors describe as 'bad housekeeping'. He said, "By leaving exuviae around the colony, aphids make detection easier for the parasite wasps. As such, this behaviour has been thought counter-selective. Here we show that the exuviae act as a decoy, and the time the wasps spend investigating the old shells limits the damage done to the aphid population".

Aphidiinae wasps use an ovipositor at the rear of their abdomen to lay their eggs inside aphids. Eventually, the development of the parasitoid larva is fatal for the aphid concerned. The authors predicted that the areas littered with exuviae decoys would be seen as poor hunting grounds by the wasps who would move on to other patches. In fact, Muratori describes how, "We found that parasitoid females spent more time in patches that contained exuviae than in patches that contained only aphids, suggesting that these females either did not recognize exuviae as low quality hosts or needed time to correctly identify them".

The potential gain for the individual aphids comes from the increased time available to escape from the colony while the wasps are investigating the decoys. According to the authors, "Aphids release an alarm pheromone when they are under parasitoid attack, giving other aphids time to escape. In nature this is achieved by dropping off the plant".

Notes to Editors

1. Bad housekeeping: why do aphids leave their exuviae inside the colony?
Frederic B Muratori, David D Damiens, Thierry Hance and Guy Boivin
BMC Evolutionary Biology (in press)

During embargo, article available here: http://www.biomedcentral.com/imedia/1187872736201037_article.pdf?random=264982
After the embargo, article available at journal website: http://www.biomedcentral.com/bmcevolbiol/

Please name the journal in any story you write. If you are writing for the web, please link to the article. All articles are available free of charge, according to BioMed Central's open access policy.

Article citation and URL available on request at press@biomedcentral.com on the day of publication

2. Images of aphids and wasps are available here:
http://www.biomedcentral.com/graphics/email/images/Aphid1.jpg
http://www.biomedcentral.com/graphics/email/images/Aphid2.jpg
http://www.biomedcentral.com/graphics/email/images/Aphid3.jpg

3. BMC Evolutionary Biology is an open access journal publishing original peer-reviewed research articles in all aspects of molecular and non-molecular evolution of all organisms, as well as phylogenetics and palaeontology. BMC Evolutionary Biology (ISSN 1471-2148) is indexed/tracked/covered by PubMed, MEDLINE, BIOSIS, CAS, Zoological Record, Thomson Reuters (ISI) and Google Scholar. It has an impact factor of 4.09.

4. BioMed Central (http://www.biomedcentral.com/) is an STM (Science, Technology and Medicine) publisher which has pioneered the open access publishing model. All peer-reviewed research articles published by BioMed Central are made immediately and freely accessible online, and are licensed to allow redistribution and reuse. BioMed Central is part of Springer Science+Business Media, a leading global publisher in the STM sector.

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