ABSTRACT
This chapter provides a general description of Insect behaviors elicited by chemical messengers, the structure of representative chemicals, and the structure and function of the organs involved in their perception. Chemical messengers have been classified according to their communicative roles, the types of behaviors elicited by the chemicals, and the latency and/or duration of response to the chemical once perceived. Volatile chemical messengers are generally perceived by olfactory sensilla located on the antennae of the insect. The pathways and processes involved in the olfactory perception of a chemical messenger have been hypothesized. Electrophysiological investigations of insect olfactory perception at the single cellular and whole antennal levels have led to the classification of the olfactory receptor cells and pheromone receptor systems of insects. Aphrodisiac pheromones are substances produced by one sex, often by the male as a part of courtship behavior, which prepare the other sex for mating after the two sexes are brought together by some other means.
