Water-seeking behavior in worm-infected crickets and reversibility of parasitic manipulation. - Archive ouverte HAL Accéder directement au contenu
Article Dans Une Revue Behavioral Ecology Année : 2011

Water-seeking behavior in worm-infected crickets and reversibility of parasitic manipulation.

Résumé

One of the most fascinating examples of parasite-induced host manipulation is that of hairworms, first, because they induce a spectacular "suicide" water-seeking behavior in their terrestrial insect hosts and, second, because the emergence of the parasite is not lethal per se for the host that can live several months following parasite release. The mechanisms hairworms use to increase the encounter rate between their host and water remain, however, poorly understood. Considering the selective landscape in which nematomorph manipulation has evolved as well as previously obtained proteomics data, we predicted that crickets harboring mature hairworms would display a modified behavioral response to light. Since following parasite emergence in water, the cricket host and parasitic worm do not interact physiologically anymore, we also predicted that the host would recover from the modified behaviors. We examined the effect of hairworm infection on different behavioral responses of the host when stimulated by light to record responses from uninfected, infected, and ex-infected crickets. We showed that hairworm infection fundamentally modifies cricket behavior by inducing directed responses to light, a condition from which they mostly recover once the parasite is released. This study supports the idea that host manipulation by parasites is subtle, complex, and multidimensional.
Fichier principal
Vignette du fichier
Ponton2011_Water.pdf (368 Ko) Télécharger le fichier
Origine : Fichiers éditeurs autorisés sur une archive ouverte
Loading...

Dates et versions

hal-00814753 , version 1 (17-04-2013)

Licence

Paternité - Pas d'utilisation commerciale

Identifiants

Citer

Fleur Ponton, Fernando Otálora-Luna, Thierry Lefèvre, Patrick M Guerin, Camille Lebarbenchon, et al.. Water-seeking behavior in worm-infected crickets and reversibility of parasitic manipulation.. Behavioral Ecology, 2011, 22 (2), pp.392-400. ⟨10.1093/beheco/arq215⟩. ⟨hal-00814753⟩
216 Consultations
238 Téléchargements

Altmetric

Partager

Gmail Facebook X LinkedIn More