ArticleProceedings. Biological sciences2015
Functional role of phenylacetic acid from metapleural gland secretions in controlling fungal pathogens in evolutionarily derived leaf-cutting ants.
Article in Proceedings. Biological sciences, 2015. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 24 papers.
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Who cites it
24 citing papers in PubMed, 53 citations in OpenAlex.
- Leafcutter Ant Farmers Prevent Loss of Edible Symbiotic Structures by Maintaining Allelic Diversity in Their Multinucleate Fungal Crop.Molecular ecology · 2026Article
- Digging into the evolutionary history of the fungus-growing-ant symbiont, Escovopsis (Hypocreaceae).Communications biology · 2025Article
- From the inside out: Were the cuticularPNAS nexus · 2024Article
- Targeted treatment of injured nestmates with antimicrobial compounds in an ant society.Nature communications · 2023Article
- Comparing the succession of microbial communities throughout development in field and laboratory nests of the ambrosia beetleFrontiers in microbiology · 2023Article
- Distinct and enhanced hygienic responses of a leaf-cutting ant toward repeated fungi exposures.Ecology and evolution · 2022Article
- The Symbiotic FungusInsects · 2022Review
- Interactions amongJournal of fungi (Basel, Switzerland) · 2021Article
- Competition-based screening helps to secure the evolutionary stability of a defensive microbiome.BMC biology · 2021Article
- Ammonia Production byMicroorganisms · 2021Article
- Article
- Disease management in two sympatricEcology and evolution · 2021Article
- Nutritional niches reveal fundamental domestication trade-offs in fungus-farming ants.Nature ecology & evolution · 2021Article
- Nest substrate, more than ant activity, drives fungal pathogen community dissimilarity in seed-dispersing ant nests.Oecologia · 2020Article
- Chemical warfare between fungus-growing ants and their pathogens.Current opinion in chemical biology · 2020Review
- A Comparison of Isolation Methods for Black Fungi Degrading Aromatic Toxins.Mycopathologia · 2019Article
- Hygiene Defense Behaviors Used by a Fungus-Growing Ant Depend on the Fungal Pathogen Stages.Insects · 2019Article
- A Visual Guide for Studying Behavioral Defenses to Pathogen Attacks in Leaf-Cutting Ants.Journal of visualized experiments : JoVE · 2018Article
- Chemical warfare between leafcutter ant symbionts and a co-evolved pathogen.Nature communications · 2018Article
- Pyrazines from bacteria and ants: convergent chemistry within an ecological niche.Scientific reports · 2018Article
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Authors and funding
8 authors at 2 institutions in 4 countries.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Fungus-farming ant colonies vary four to five orders of magnitude in size. They employ compounds from actinomycete bacteria and exocrine glands as antimicrobial agents. Atta colonies have millions of ants and are particularly relevant for understanding hygienic strategies as they have abandoned their ancestors' prime dependence on antibiotic-based biological control in favour of using metapleural gland (MG) chemical secretions. Atta MGs are unique in synthesizing large quantities of phenylacetic acid (PAA), a known but little investigated antimicrobial agent. We show that particularly the smallest workers greatly reduce germination rates of Escovopsis and Metarhizium spores after actively applying PAA to experimental infection targets in garden fragments and transferring the spores to the ants' infrabuccal cavities. In vitro assays further indicated that Escovopsis strains isolated from evolutionarily derived leaf-cutting ants are less sensitive to PAA than strains from phylogenetically more basal fungus-farming ants, consistent with the dynamics of an evolutionary arms race between virulence and control for Escovopsis, but not Metarhizium. Atta ants form larger colonies with more extreme caste differentiation relative to other attines, in societies characterized by an almost complete absence of reproductive conflicts. We hypothesize that these changes are associated with unique evolutionary innovations in chemical pest management that appear robust against selection pressure for resistance by specialized mycopathogens.
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