A single class of olfactory neurons mediates behavioural responses to a Drosophila sex pheromone

Amina Kurtovic, Alexandre Widmer and Barry J. Dickson ()
Additional contact information
Amina Kurtovic: Research Institute of Molecular Pathology (IMP), Dr Bohr-gasse 7, A-1030 Vienna, Austria
Alexandre Widmer: Research Institute of Molecular Pathology (IMP), Dr Bohr-gasse 7, A-1030 Vienna, Austria
Barry J. Dickson: Research Institute of Molecular Pathology (IMP), Dr Bohr-gasse 7, A-1030 Vienna, Austria

Nature, 2007, vol. 446, issue 7135, 542-546

Abstract: Unisex pheromones The volatile pheromone 11-cis-vaccenyl acetate (cVA) is produced by male Drosophila, and several lines of evidence suggest that it guides mating behaviour via the Or67d receptor in olfactory receptor neurons. Targeted mutation of the Or67d gene confirms that that is the case, but with a twist. cVA acts in both sexes but in males it inhibits mating behaviour; in females it promotes it. Males lacking Or67d inappropriately court other males, whereas females with the mutation become less receptive to courting males. This work shows that a pheromone is sensed by a dedicated olfactory channel anatomically and functionally distinct from the multi-channel coding of common odours.

Date: 2007
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (8)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.nature.com/articles/nature05672 Abstract (text/html)
Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:nat:nature:v:446:y:2007:i:7135:d:10.1038_nature05672

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
https://www.nature.com/

DOI: 10.1038/nature05672

Access Statistics for this article

Nature is currently edited by Magdalena Skipper

More articles in Nature from Nature
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().