• HOME
  • NEWS
  • EXPLORE
    • CAREER
      • Companies
      • Jobs
    • EVENTS
    • iGEM
      • News
      • Team
    • PHOTOS
    • VIDEO
    • WIKI
  • BLOG
  • COMMUNITY
    • FACEBOOK
    • INSTAGRAM
    • TWITTER
Wednesday, October 29, 2025
BIOENGINEER.ORG
No Result
View All Result
  • Login
  • HOME
  • NEWS
  • EXPLORE
    • CAREER
      • Companies
      • Jobs
        • Lecturer
        • PhD Studentship
        • Postdoc
        • Research Assistant
    • EVENTS
    • iGEM
      • News
      • Team
    • PHOTOS
    • VIDEO
    • WIKI
  • BLOG
  • COMMUNITY
    • FACEBOOK
    • INSTAGRAM
    • TWITTER
  • HOME
  • NEWS
  • EXPLORE
    • CAREER
      • Companies
      • Jobs
        • Lecturer
        • PhD Studentship
        • Postdoc
        • Research Assistant
    • EVENTS
    • iGEM
      • News
      • Team
    • PHOTOS
    • VIDEO
    • WIKI
  • BLOG
  • COMMUNITY
    • FACEBOOK
    • INSTAGRAM
    • TWITTER
No Result
View All Result
Bioengineer.org
No Result
View All Result
Home NEWS Science News

Botany: Scent of death attracts coffin flies to pipevine flowers

Bioengineer by Bioengineer
September 6, 2025
in Science News
Reading Time: 3 mins read
0
IMAGE
Share on FacebookShare on TwitterShare on LinkedinShare on RedditShare on Telegram

Plants use numerous mechanisms for their pollination. Now botanists have discovered a particularly sophisticated system among pipevines that is based purely on deception.

The flowers of the Greek plant Aristolochia microstoma emit a foul, musty scent that seems to mimic the smell of decaying insects. The fly pollinators from the genus Megaselia likely get attracted to this odor while searching for arthropod corpses to potentially mate over and lay their eggs. Then, when entering the tube of an Aristolochia flower, the flies are guided by downward-pointing hairs into a small chamber, which holds the female and male floral organs. Trapped inside, they deposit pollen they carry onto the stigma, before the stamens ripen and release pollen on the body of the flies. When the hairs that block the entrance to the chamber wither, the pollinators can escape, and a new cycle can begin.

“Here we show that the flowers of A. microstoma emit a highly unusual mix of volatiles that includes alkylpyrazines, which are otherwise rarely produced by flowering plants. Our data suggest that this is the only plant species known so far to deceive pollinators attracted to the smell of dead and rotting arthropods, rather than vertebrate carrion,” says corresponding author Prof Stefan Dötterl, the head of the plant ecology group and the Botanical Garden at the Paris-Lodron University of Salzburg, Austria.

Between 4-6% of flowering plants are deceptive: they use odor, color, and / or tactile signals to advertise a reward to pollinators, such as nectar, pollen, or mating and breeding sites, but do not actually give this reward. The deception works because pollinators are poor at distinguishing between the reward and the mimic. Deceptive pollination is typical of many orchids, but has also independently evolved many times in other plants, including the genus Aristolochia.

“Aristolochia contains over 550 species spread around the world, especially in tropical and subtropical areas. Aristolochia species are mostly woody vines and herbaceous perennial plants with spectacular, complex flowers that temporarily imprison their visitors for pollination purposes”, explains Prof Christoph Neinhuis, co-author of the study, who cultivates one of the largest Aristolochia collection worldwide at the Botanical Garden of TU Dresden.

“Many Aristolochia are known to attract flies with floral scents, for example mimicking the smell of carrion or feces of mammals, decaying plants, or fungi,” says Thomas Rupp, first author of the study. “But our curiosity was piqued by A. microstoma, a small herb known only from Greece: unlike other Aristolochia with their colorful, showy flowers, A. microstoma has inconspicuous brownish flowers that lie horizontally – close to the ground or partly buried, among leaf litter or between rocks.”

“A. microstoma flowers emit a simple but highly unusual mix of scents that includes 2,5-dimethylpyrazine, a molecule that does not occur in vertebrate carcasses or feces, but in dead beetles. The unpleasant, carrion-like scent can be noticed by people even at a short distance,” concludes botanist Prof. Stefan Wanke from TU Dresden.

###

Original publication:

Rupp Thomas, Oelschlägel Birgit, Rabitsch Katharina, Mahfoud Hafez, Wenke Torsten, Disney R. Henry L., Neinhuis Christoph, Wanke Stefan, Dötterl Stefan. Flowers of Deceptive Aristolochia microstoma Are Pollinated by Phorid Flies and Emit Volatiles Known From Invertebrate Carrion. Front. Ecol. Evol., 21 May 2021 | https://doi.org/10.3389/fevo.2021.658441

Media Contact
Prof. Stefan Wanke
[email protected]

Related Journal Article

http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fevo.2021.658441

Tags: BiologyPlant Sciences
Share12Tweet8Share2ShareShareShare2

Related Posts

Understanding Countertransference in Eating Disorder Therapy

October 29, 2025

Assessing Turkish Regret Intensity Scale’s Validity and Reliability

October 29, 2025

Ethical Challenges in Caring for Immigrant Patients

October 29, 2025

Assessing MMSPE: Validity and Reliability in Indonesian Kids

October 29, 2025
Please login to join discussion

POPULAR NEWS

  • Sperm MicroRNAs: Crucial Mediators of Paternal Exercise Capacity Transmission

    1289 shares
    Share 515 Tweet 322
  • Stinkbug Leg Organ Hosts Symbiotic Fungi That Protect Eggs from Parasitic Wasps

    311 shares
    Share 124 Tweet 78
  • ESMO 2025: mRNA COVID Vaccines Enhance Efficacy of Cancer Immunotherapy

    199 shares
    Share 80 Tweet 50
  • New Study Suggests ALS and MS May Stem from Common Environmental Factor

    135 shares
    Share 54 Tweet 34

About

We bring you the latest biotechnology news from best research centers and universities around the world. Check our website.

Follow us

Recent News

Understanding Countertransference in Eating Disorder Therapy

Assessing Turkish Regret Intensity Scale’s Validity and Reliability

Ethical Challenges in Caring for Immigrant Patients

Subscribe to Blog via Email

Enter your email address to subscribe to this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email.

Join 67 other subscribers
  • Contact Us

Bioengineer.org © Copyright 2023 All Rights Reserved.

Welcome Back!

Login to your account below

Forgotten Password?

Retrieve your password

Please enter your username or email address to reset your password.

Log In
No Result
View All Result
  • Homepages
    • Home Page 1
    • Home Page 2
  • News
  • National
  • Business
  • Health
  • Lifestyle
  • Science

Bioengineer.org © Copyright 2023 All Rights Reserved.