{"id":560,"date":"2018-03-30T14:35:13","date_gmt":"2018-03-30T03:35:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ppmmagazine.com.au\/?p=560"},"modified":"2025-05-06T18:46:31","modified_gmt":"2025-05-06T08:46:31","slug":"termite-royalty-pheromone-identified","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/professionalpestmanager.com\/nz\/termite-research\/termite-royalty-pheromone-identified\/","title":{"rendered":"TERMITE ROYALTY PHEROMONE IDENTIFIED"},"content":{"rendered":"

Researchers at North Carolina State University in the US have identified a specific chemical on the exoskeletons of royal termites that they believe allows worker termites to recognise royal status.<\/em> (Main photo credit: Dann Thombs<\/a>) <\/em>
\n<\/strong><\/p>\n

Researchers at North Carolina State University in the US have for the first time identified a specific chemical used by the higher termite castes\u00a0\u2013 the queens and the kings \u2013 to communicate their royal status with worker termites. The findings potentially advance our knowledge of termite behaviour and the evolution of social insects.<\/p>\n

For social insects, such as termites and insects of the order Hymenoptera (ants, bees and wasps), chemical communication using pheromones is vitally important to the success of the colony, as it allows nestmates to recognise each other. It is well documented that some pheromones are caste-specific, meaning a particular cuticular hydrocarbon (CHC) may only be found on the exoskeletons of workers, or soldiers, for example. This allows an insect to recognise not only nestmates, but also recognise the caste to which another fellow insect belongs.<\/p>\n

Isolating pheromones<\/strong><\/h2>\n

In the study published in\u00a0Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences<\/em>, co-authors Professor Coby<\/strong> Schal<\/strong> and PhD graduate Colin Funaro <\/strong>used gas chromatography to isolate specific chemicals on the exoskeletons of royal and worker\u00a0Reticulitermes flavipes<\/em>\u00a0termites.<\/p>\n

They discovered heneicosane \u2013\u00a0a wax-like hydrocarbon, consisting of only carbon and hydrogen atoms \u2013\u00a0on body surface of the royal termites, but not on workers. It is the first time a royalty-recognition pheromone has been identified.<\/p>\n

Worker response to fake royals<\/strong><\/h2>\n

The researchers used glass dummies serving as royal termite proxies and treated the dummies with various extracts to test the reactions of the other termites. As a control, the researchers treated the dummies with worker extract alone.<\/p>\n

\"Termites<\/a>
Click to watch video of termites showing shaking and antennation in presence of Queen<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

When the researchers treated the dummies with a blend of worker extract and heneicosane \u2013\u00a0the CHC found on the exoskeleteons of the royal termites \u2013\u00a0worker termites exhibited increased levels of shaking, a behaviour they tend to exhibit naturally in the presence of reproductives. They showed both lateral and longitudinal shaking behaviour and also increased antennation.<\/p>\n

\"Termites<\/a>
Click to watch video of termites responding to dummy coating in royal pheromone<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The termites demonstrated significantly lower levels of shaking towards the dummies treated with worker extract.<\/p>\n

\u201cTermites use a two-step recognition process \u2013 the colony’s odour gives workers a \u2018home\u2019 context and heneicosane within this context denotes \u2018royals are in the home\u2019,\u201d explained Professor Schal.<\/p>\n

Mr Funaro added, \u201cThe royal-recognition pheromone lets workers know that there is a queen or a king present and that everything is stable in the colony. Worker termites shook more when realising that the royals were also nestmates.”<\/p>\n

The researchers believe that the presence of heneicosane on the royal termites\u2019 exoskeletons allows worker termites to recognise and care for them, which serves to maintain order within the colony.<\/p>\n

A question of evolution<\/strong><\/h2>\n

The study calls into question the widely held belief that queens of the insect order Hymenoptera were the first to use these wax-like hydrocarbon pheromones for royal recognition.<\/p>\n

Termite colonies are unusual in that they are founded by a monogamous kind and queen pair of primary reproductives, whereas in social Hymenopteran colonies, males have only a transient presence. \u201cThis is the first report of a queen recognition pheromone in termites and the first report of a king recognition pheromone in insects,\u201d said Professor Schal.<\/p>\n

\u201cTermites appeared some 150 million years ago while the social Hymenoptera appeared about 100 million years ago, so this discovery of a hydrocarbon as a royal-recognition pheromone in termites appears to predate its use in social insects,\u201d Professor Schal said.<\/p>\n

Future research<\/strong><\/h2>\n

The researchers believe further study should investigate deeper as to whether king and queen termites in fact have their own sex-specific pheromones. The shaking response could also be explored further, as although the shaking behaviours are widely seen throughout the colony of most termite lineages, a deeper investigation could broaden our understanding of termite behavioural patterns.<\/p>\n

The discovery of this royalty recognition pheromone also gives rise to a number of questions as to how this, and other unidentified pheromones, may control worker behaviour and the development of reproductives within the colony \u2013 functions that are controlled by pheromones in the Hymenoptera.<\/p>\n

More termite information<\/a><\/p>\n

<\/div>\n

Source<\/strong>: North Carolina State University. \u2018Termite queen, king recognition pheromone identified\u2019. ScienceDaily<\/a>, 19 March 2018.<\/p>\n

Journal reference<\/strong>: Colin F. Funaro, Katalin B\u00f6r\u00f6czky, Edward L. Vargo, Coby Schal.\u00a0\u2018Identification of a queen and king recognition pheromone in the subterranean termite Reticulitermes flavipes\u2019.\u00a0Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences<\/em>, 2018; 201721419.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Researchers at North Carolina State University in the US have identified a specific chemical on the exoskeletons of royal termites that they believe allows worker termites to recognise royal status. (Main photo credit: Dann Thombs)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":570,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_gspb_post_css":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[372],"tags":[],"company":[],"pest":[150],"pesticide":[],"product-service":[],"class_list":["post-560","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-termite-research","pest-termites","wpbf-post"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/professionalpestmanager.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/560","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/professionalpestmanager.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/professionalpestmanager.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/professionalpestmanager.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/professionalpestmanager.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=560"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/professionalpestmanager.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/560\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":39276,"href":"https:\/\/professionalpestmanager.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/560\/revisions\/39276"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/professionalpestmanager.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/570"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/professionalpestmanager.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=560"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/professionalpestmanager.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=560"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/professionalpestmanager.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=560"},{"taxonomy":"company","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/professionalpestmanager.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/company?post=560"},{"taxonomy":"pest","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/professionalpestmanager.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pest?post=560"},{"taxonomy":"pesticide","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/professionalpestmanager.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pesticide?post=560"},{"taxonomy":"product-service","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/professionalpestmanager.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/product-service?post=560"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}