Journal
SCIENCE
Volume 368, Issue 6497, Pages 1377-+Publisher
AMER ASSOC ADVANCEMENT SCIENCE
DOI: 10.1126/science.aba2965
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Funding
- Swiss National Science Foundation [P2ZHP3 178087]
- PAPIIT-UNAM [IN211916]
- SEP-CONACYT [2015-255544]
- Mitsui Chair
- Max Planck Society
- NOMIS Foundation
- University of Zurich Research Priority Program on Global Change and Biodiversity
- Swiss National Science Foundation (SNF) [P2ZHP3_178087] Funding Source: Swiss National Science Foundation (SNF)
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Plants emit an extraordinary diversity of chemicals that provide information about their identity and mediate their interactions with insects. However, most studies of this have focused on a few model species in controlled environments, limiting our capacity to understand plant-insect chemical communication in ecological communities. Here, by integrating information theory with ecological and evolutionary theories, we show that a stable information structure of plant volatile organic compounds (VOCs) can emerge from a conflicting information process between plants and herbivores. We corroborate this information arms race theory with field data recording plant-VOC associations and plant-herbivore interactions in a tropical dry forest. We reveal that plant VOC redundancy and herbivore specialization can be explained by a conflicting information transfer. Information-based communication approaches can increase our understanding of species interactions across trophic levels.
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