Plants have evolved complex biochemical mechanisms to counter threats from insect herbivory. Recent research has revealed an important role of roots in plant responses to above ground herbivory (AGH). The involvement of roots is integral to plant resistance and tolerance mechanisms. Roots not only play an active role in plant defenses by acting as sites for biosynthesis of various toxins and bu...

Many insect pests utilize plant volatiles for host location and untangling the mechanisms of this process can provide tools for pest management. Numerous experimental results have been published on the effect of plant volatiles on insect pests. We used a meta-analysis to summarize this knowledge and to look for patterns. Our goal was to identify herbivore and plant traits that might explain the...

1. As herbivory often elicits systemic changes in plant traits, indirect interactions via induced plant responses may be a pervasive feature structuring herbivore communities. Although the importance of this phenomenon has been emphasised for herbivorous insects, it is unknown if and how induced responses contribute to the organisation of other major phytoparasitic taxa. 2. Survey and experimen...

An increasing number of plant-insect studies using phylogenetic analysis suggest that cospeciation events are rare in plant-insect systems. Instead, nonrandom patterns of phylogenetic congruence are produced by phylogenetically conserved host switching (to related plants) or tracking of particular resources or traits (e.g., chemical). The dominance of host switching in many phytophagous insect ...

Plants are members of complex communities and function as a link between above- and below-ground organisms. Associations between plants and soil-borne microbes commonly occur and have often been found beneficial for plant fitness. Root-associated microbes may trigger physiological changes in the host plant that influence interactions between plants and aboveground insects at several trophic lev...

A major challenge for current biology is to integrate research approaches that address different levels of biological organization, from subcellular mechanisms to functions in ecological communities. The study of plant-insect interactions provides interesting options for this. Ample information at the subcellular and the individual level is available on the one hand, while important insight in ...

The plant family Umbelliferae (Apiaceae) consists of almost 3000 species worldwide (112). Members of the family occupy a wide variety of habitats, including deserts, basaltic bluffs, salt and freshwater marshes, chaparral, forests, waste places, and subalpine tundra. Despite the ecological diversity, however, family members display remarkable morphological conservatism. The integrity of the fam...

Plant-emitted volatile organic compounds (VOCs) play important roles in plant-insect interactions. Atmospheric pollutants such as ozone (O3) can react with VOCs and affect the dynamics and fidelity of these interactions. However, the effects of atmospheric degradation of plant VOCs on plant-insect interactions remains understudied. We used a system comprising Brassica oleracea subsp. capitata (...