Fruit Flies Get Turned on by First True Aphrodisiac Fruit
releases compounds that get male flies in the mood to copulate,
so their lady friends lay eggs in hospitable rotting fruit.
CREDIT: Wikimedia commons user Mr.checker Humans have been
searching for that sexually arousing aphrodisiac for centuries.
Now, researchers have finally found the first true aphrodisiac,
but alas, it only turns on fruit flies. While other substances,
such as chocolate and oysters, have been thought of as
aphrodisiacs, these claims have failed every scientific test.
The new study found that the scent of ripe and rotting fruit
gets fruit flies called Drosophila melanogaster in the mood by
turning on courtship-initiating brain pathways. These pathways,
or networks of connected neurons, had previously been discovered
to encourage fruit-fly males to engage in courtship displays and
start mating. But scientists hadn't known that fruit smells
could activate the pathway. "This is one of the first cases of a
food aphrodisiac, a specific se