Hubei Insect Resources Utilization and Sustainable Pest Management Key Laboratory, College of Plant Science and Technology, Huazhong Agricultural University, Wuhan, 430070, Hubei, China.
CAS Key Laboratory of Tropical Forest Ecology, Xishuangbanna Tropical Botanical Garden, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Kunming, Yunnan Province, 650223, China.
Commun Biol. 2021 Sep 23;4(1):1121. doi: 10.1038/s42003-021-02661-6.
The volatile trail pheromone is an ephemeral chemical cue, whereas the geomagnetic field (GMF) provides a stable positional reference. However, it is unclear whether and how the cryptic termites perceive the GMF for orientation in light or darkness until now. Here, we found that the two termite species, Reticulitermes chinensis and Odontotermes formosanus, use the GMF for orientation. Our silencing cryptochrome 2 (Cry2) impaired magnetic orientation in white light but had no significant impact in complete darkness, suggesting that Cry2 can mediate magnetic orientation in termites only under light. Coincidentally, the presence of magnetic particles enabled the magnetic orientation of termites in darkness. When knock-downing the olfactory co-receptor (Orco) to exclude the effect of trail pheromone, unexpectedly, we found that the Orco participated in termite magnetic orientation under both light and darkness. Our findings revealed a novel magnetoreception model depending on the joint action of radical pair, magnetic particle, and olfactory co-receptor.
挥发性踪迹信息素是一种短暂的化学线索，而地磁场（GMF）提供了一个稳定的位置参考。然而，直到现在，还不清楚隐蔽的白蚁是否以及如何感知 GMF 以在光或黑暗中进行定位。在这里，我们发现两种白蚁，黑胸散白蚁和台湾乳白蚁，利用 GMF 进行定位。我们沉默隐花色素 2（Cry2）会损害白光中的磁定向，但在完全黑暗中没有显著影响，这表明 Cry2 只能在光下介导白蚁的磁定向。巧合的是，磁性颗粒的存在使白蚁能够在黑暗中进行磁定向。当敲低嗅觉共受体（Orco）以排除踪迹信息素的影响时，出乎意料的是，我们发现 Orco 参与了光和暗条件下的白蚁磁定向。我们的发现揭示了一种新的磁受体模型，该模型依赖于自由基对、磁性颗粒和嗅觉共受体的共同作用。
