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Article
Open AccessRising temperatures favour defence-suppressing herbivores
Rising temperatures due to climate change are predicted to accelerate the life cycle of arthropod herbivores thereby exacerbating pest formation. Notorious pests like spider mites thrive in areas with high tem...
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Article
Open AccessImperfect diet choice reduces the performance of a predatory mite
Two mutually unexclusive hypotheses prevail in the theory of nutritional ecology: the balanced diet hypothesis states that consumers feed on different food items because they have complementary nutrient and en...
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Article
Open AccessIntradiol ring cleavage dioxygenases from herbivorous spider mites as a new detoxification enzyme family in animals
Generalist herbivores such as the two-spotted spider mite Tetranychus urticae thrive on a wide variety of plants and can rapidly adapt to novel hosts. What traits enable polyphagous herbivores to cope with the di...
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Article
The omnivorous predator Macrolophus pygmaeus induces production of plant volatiles that attract a specialist predator
It has become clear that omnivorous predators can induce plant defences that affect the performance and host plant choice of herbivores. They are also known to induce the production of plant volatiles that can...
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Article
Open AccessSpider Mites Cause More Damage to Tomato in the Dark When Induced Defenses Are Lower
Plants have evolved robust mechanisms to cope with incidental variation (e.g. herbivory) and periodical variation (e.g. light/darkness during the day-night cycle) in their environment. It has been shown that a...
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Article
Open AccessReproductive interference and sensitivity to female pheromones in males and females of two herbivorous mite species
Competitive interaction between sister species can be affected by reproductive interference (RI) depending on the ability of males to discriminate conspecific from heterospecific mates. We study such interacti...
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Article
Open AccessCorrection to: Phytophagy of omnivorous predator Macrolophus pygmaeus affects performance of herbivores through induced plant defences
Unfortunately, the citation of one of the papers was published erroneously in the original version and corrected here by this Erratum. The original article was corrected.
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Article
Open AccessPhytophagy of omnivorous predator Macrolophus pygmaeus affects performance of herbivores through induced plant defences
Plants possess various inducible defences that result in synthesis of specialized metabolites in response to herbivory, which can interfere with the performance of herbivores of the same and other species. Muc...
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Article
Open AccessDrought stress promotes the colonization success of a herbivorous mite that manipulates plant defenses
Climate change is expected to bring longer periods of drought and this may affect the plant’s ability to resist pests. We assessed if water deficit affects the tomato russet mite (TRM; Aculops lycopersici), a key...
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Article
Open AccessThe role of web sharing, species recognition and host-plant defence in interspecific competition between two herbivorous mite species
When competing with indigenous species, invasive species face a problem, because they typically start with a few colonizers. Evidently, some species succeeded, begging an answer to the question how they invade...
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Article
Open AccessDefense suppression benefits herbivores that have a monopoly on their feeding site but can backfire within natural communities
Plants have inducible defenses to combat attacking organisms. Hence, some herbivores have adapted to suppress these defenses. Suppression of plant defenses has been shown to benefit herbivores by boosting thei...
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Chapter
The Impact of Induced Plant Volatiles on Plant-Arthropod Interactions
Plants release volatile organic compounds from their vegetative tissues into their environment during most of their life cycle. The functions of these volatiles are diverse and not always known but some of the...
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Chapter
Induction and Suppression of Herbivore-Induced Indirect Defenses
Plants release volatiles into the air. Upon herbivory, the amounts they release from the vegetative tissues increases dramatically. Although the physiological necessity for this increased emission is not fully...