Publication Date:
2009-01-10
Description:
The familiar buzz of flying mosquitoes is an important mating signal, with the fundamental frequency of the female's flight tone signaling her presence. In the yellow fever and dengue vector Aedes aegypti, both sexes interact acoustically by shifting their flight tones to match, resulting in a courtship duet. Matching is made not at the fundamental frequency of 400 hertz (female) or 600 hertz (male) but at a shared harmonic of 1200 hertz, which exceeds the previously known upper limit of hearing in mosquitoes. Physiological recordings from Johnston's organ (the mosquito's "ear") reveal sensitivity up to 2000 hertz, consistent with our observed courtship behavior. These findings revise widely accepted limits of acoustic behavior in mosquitoes.〈br /〉〈br /〉〈a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2847473/" target="_blank"〉〈img src="https://static.pubmed.gov/portal/portal3rc.fcgi/4089621/img/3977009" border="0"〉〈/a〉 〈a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2847473/" target="_blank"〉This paper as free author manuscript - peer-reviewed and accepted for publication〈/a〉〈br /〉〈br /〉〈span class="detail_caption"〉Notes: 〈/span〉Cator, Lauren J -- Arthur, Ben J -- Harrington, Laura C -- Hoy, Ronald R -- R01 DC000103/DC/NIDCD NIH HHS/ -- R01 DC000103-34/DC/NIDCD NIH HHS/ -- New York, N.Y. -- Science. 2009 Feb 20;323(5917):1077-9. doi: 10.1126/science.1166541. Epub 2009 Jan 8.〈br /〉〈span class="detail_caption"〉Author address: 〈/span〉Department of Entomology, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY 14853, USA.〈br /〉〈span class="detail_caption"〉Record origin:〈/span〉 〈a href="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19131593" target="_blank"〉PubMed〈/a〉
Keywords:
Aedes/*physiology
;
*Animal Communication
;
Animals
;
Auditory Perception
;
Dengue/transmission
;
Evoked Potentials
;
Female
;
Flight, Animal
;
Hearing
;
Insect Vectors/*physiology
;
Male
;
Pitch Perception
;
Sense Organs/physiology
;
*Sexual Behavior, Animal
;
Wings, Animal/physiology
Print ISSN:
0036-8075
Electronic ISSN:
1095-9203
Topics:
Biology
,
Chemistry and Pharmacology
,
Computer Science
,
Medicine
,
Natural Sciences in General
,
Physics
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