Semut Zombie
A parasitic fungus known to manipulate the brains of ants doesn't make slavelike "zombies" out of any old host.
Serangga yang dimaksud di sini adalah semut 'zombie'. Sebuah penelitian terbaru yang sudah diterbitkan di jurnal PNAS secara online, menyoroti tanda-tanda misterius yang dialami oleh semut 'zombie', semut tukang kayu tropis (Camponotus rufipes) yang mati di dedaunan hutan tropis dan dipenuhi jamur parasit seluruh tubuhnya.
Instead, the microorganism is somehow able to recognize the brains of different ant species, and releases its mind-controlling chemical cocktailonly when in its preferred host, new research shows.
Disebut semut zombie, karena seluruh tubuh semut itu kaku dipenuhi selaput putih semacam jamur. Jamur parasit harus membunuh semut di luar sarangnya agar bisa mereproduksi dan menularkan infeksi, kemudian memastikan semua anggota koloni mati. Jamur parasit ini masuk ke dalam tubuh semut hingga berujung pada kematian.
"Behavioral manipulation is such a complex [characteristic] that it only occurs when there's a very close coevolution between pathogen and host," said Charissa de Bekker, a molecular biologist at Pennsylvania State University and lead author of the new study, published in August in the journal BMC Evolutionary Biology.
"The theory is that every species of ant has its own species of fungi that it gets infected by," de Bekker told Live Science. [Mind Control: See Images of Zombie Ants]