Structural plasticity of olfactory neuropils in relation to insect diapause

1. Many insects that live in temperate zones spend the cold season in a state of dormancy, referred to as diapause. As the insect must rely on resources that were gathered before entering diapause, keeping a low metabolic rate is of utmost importance. Organs that are metabolically expensive to maintain, such as the brain, can therefore become a liability to survival if they are too large. 2. Insects that go through diapause as adults generally do so before entering the season of reproduction. This order of events introduces a conflict between maintaining low metabolism during dormancy, and emerging afterwards with highly developed sensory systems that improve fitness during the mating season. 3. We investigated the timing of when investments into the olfactory system are made by measuring the volumes of primary and secondary olfactory neuropils in the brain as they fluctuate in size throughout the extended diapause life-period of adult Polygonia c-album butterflies. 4. Relative...1. 栖息于温带区域的多数昆虫会以蛰伏状态度过寒冷季节，该状态被称为滞育（diapause）。由于昆虫必须依赖进入滞育前储备的营养资源，维持较低的代谢速率至关重要。而维持代谢成本较高的器官（如大脑）若体积过大，则可能成为生存负担。 2. 以成虫阶段进入滞育的昆虫，通常会在踏入繁殖季前完成滞育过程。这一事件时序会引发一种权衡冲突：既要在蛰伏期维持低代谢状态，又要在滞育结束后发育出高度发达的感官系统，以提升交配季的生存适合度。 3. 本研究通过监测成虫白斑钩蛱蝶（Polygonia c-album）在整个延长的滞育生命周期内，脑内初级与次级嗅觉神经髓（olfactory neuropils）的体积变化，探究其嗅觉系统的发育时序。 4. 相对……