References & Sources

Threatened mothers have tougher offspring

Radishes and water fleas that soup up their defenses as needed pass down weaponry to their offspring even when the world has become safe again.

References:

Agrawal, A.A., C. Laforsch, and R. Tollrian. 1999. Transgenerational induction of defences in animals and plants. Nature 401(Sept. 2):60.

Further Readings:

1999. The Ecology and Evolution of Inducible Defenses, R. Tollrian, and C.D. Harvell, eds. Princeton: Princeton University Press.

Sources:

Anurag A. Agrawal
University of California, Davis
Department of Entomology
Davis, CA 95616-8584

Ellen Simms
University of California, Berkeley
Department of Integrative Biology
3060 VLSB
Berkeley, CA 94720

Ralph Tollrian
Ludwig-Maximilian University
Zoological Institute
Karlstr. 25
D-80333 Muenchen
Germany

From Science News, Vol. 156, No. 10, September 4, 1999, p. 151. Copyright © 1999, Science Service.