Functional gustatory receptors in Drosophila wings reveal their role in guidance and exploration associated to flight

Description

Chemoreception in insects is capable to detect highly diverse families of molecules like sugars, various bitter molecules, toxins, water, carbon dioxide and also a large panel of "xenobiotics", which guide exploration for ecological niches.The taste neuronal elements are amazingly present in insect wings and this feature appears highly conserved in all the winged species of insect taxa.The functionality ofthe taste organs in wings is presently unknown andthis topology suggests an intriguing role that is not documented up to date. In this report we describe that the wing anterior margin neuronal nerve responds to sugars and bitter molecules through an increase of the cytosolic Ca2+ concentration that occurs in both pathways. As expected, the effects on AMPc levels are divergent for sugar and bitter signal transduction. This sensory modality strongly suggests that the pollinator insects "taste" molecules nebulized in theair vortex created by the wing beat during flight in close vicinity to flowers. This evolutionary conserved sensory organdissociates advantageously taste from ingestion avoiding toxicity by noxious substances.

Abstract

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