Female beetles use anti-aphrodisiac to turn off the sex
Burying beetle females let males know with a chemical cue when mating is no longer useful and it's time to assist in feeding and protecting the larvae
When offspring hatch and need care, female beetles spritz a no-sex message to males
Burying beetle females produce a pheromone - a volatile chemical signal - that tells their male partner that it's time to turn his attention from sex to caring for their new offspring.
These beetles reproduce by burying a small animal carcase, and then mating and laying eggs around the carcass. Then both male and female beetles feed the decaying carrion to their newly hatched larvae.
Dr. Sandra Steiger from the Institute of Evolutionary Ecology and Conservation Genomics at the University of Ulm, Germany, discovered the anti-aphrodisiac when she was investigating how the male's attention is turned sharply from furious copulation to attentive parenting.
Related Links
- Paper in Nature Communications
- Washington Post article
- Christian Science Monitor article
- New York Times article