Making Insects Kill Each Other

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Instead of using harmful pesticides to kill invasive species, scientists are trying to get invasive species to kill each other. In experiments on Argentine ants, chemists at the University of California, Irvine, have figured out a way to manipulate the scents that insects use to identify members of their colony. The scientists are using chemicals that would transform some of the ants from friends of their colony to foes, fomenting a civil war among the ants, and causing them to kill each other. According to Conservation Magazine, these chemicals could present a more “environmentally friendly alternative to insecticides.”

Source: Conservation Magazine

Image by Arkangel, licensed under Creative Commons.

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