Parasitism causes changes in caterpillar odours and associated bacterial communities with consequences for host-location by a hyperparasitoid

The microbial communities and volatile profiles of a healthy and (endo)parasitized caterpillars of Pieris brassicae have been analyzed in order to understand the relationship between parasitism status, microbial communities variation and volatiles profiles variation.Microbial communities were analyzed by Illumina MiSeq sequencing.The understanding of the relationship between microbes and volatiles in multitrophic interactions is applicable in the development of new biological pest control methods.