Destruction of Wasps

Neuroethology of Parasitoid Wasps

Predators as diverse as snakes, scorpions, spiders, insects and snails manufacture venoms to incapacitate their prey. Most venoms contain a cocktail of neurotoxins and each neurotoxin is designed to target specific receptors in the nervous and muscular systems. Most neurotoxins act peripherally and interfere with the ability of the prey's nervous system to generate muscle contraction or relaxat...

Comparative Ethology of Solitary Wasps

Figs and fig wasps

The current project builds on previous grants under the Darwin Initiative that focused on Nepal's flora, a key one of which dealt with plant information and technology transfer, run by the Natural History Museum in London. But the current project is much more ambitious. Although only funded for three years at present, the team hopes funds will be made available for the estimated 15 years it wil...

Nematodes, figs and wasps.

Certain Ficus spp. are dependent on wasps for pollination. The invading wasps usually shed their wings on entering a fig through the ostiole; and during attempted or successful egg deposi t ion, transfer pollen to the female flowers and then die. A gall forms around each egg, and within the gall develops a male or a female wasp. Male wasps are the first to emerge from galls, and they then ferti...

Bloody Funny Wasps

Following review of formicid characters a new model for evolution of ant eusociality is presented. This “semisocial ancestry hypothesis” has the following steps: (1) Ants are descended from a solitary wasp which accumulated and collectively reared its brood in acellular nests (without individual brood cells). Metapleural glands delivering antibiotic compounds evolved in adults as a correlated a...