Pheromonal communication in amphibians

Abstract

Pheromonal communication is widespread in salamanders and newts and may also be important in some frogs and toads. Several amphibian pheromones have been behaviorally, biochemically and molecularly identified. These pheromones are typically peptides or proteins. Study of pheromone evolution in plethodontid salamanders has revealed that courtship pheromones have been subject to continual evolutionary change, perhaps as a result of co-evolution between the pheromonal ligand and its receptor. Pheromones are detected by the vomeronasal organ and main olfactory epithelium. Chemosensory neurons express vomeronasal receptors or olfactory receptors. Frogs have relatively large numbers of vomeronasal receptors that are transcribed in both the vomeronasal organ and the main olfactory epithelium. Salamander vomeronasal receptors apparently are restricted to the vomeronasal organ. To date, no chemosensory ligands have been matched to vomeronasal receptors or olfactory receptors so it is unknown whether particular receptor types are (1) specialized for detection of pheromones versus other chemosignals, or (2) specialized for detection of volatile, nonvolatile, or water-borne chemosignals. Despite progress in understanding amphibian pheromonal communication, only a small fraction of amphibian species have been examined. Study of additional species of amphibians will indicate which traits related to pheromonal communication are evolutionarily conserved and which traits have diverged over time.

Involvement of Gαolf‐expressing neurons in the vomeronasal system of Bufo japonicus

“…Our findings and those of others (Schmidt et al, 1988;Date-Ito et al, 2008;Taniguchi et al, 2008;Jungblut et al, 2009;Woodley, 2010) showed that the characteristics of the VNO are quite diversified among amphibian species. Amphibians adapt to a life that ranges from fully aquatic to fully terrestrial, and they possess unique developmental processes.…”

“…Water-soluble peptide pheromones have been identified in newts, salamanders, and one type of frog (Kikuyama et al, 1995;Rollmann et al, 1999;Wabnitz et al, 1999), and some of the pheromones were detected in the VNO (Toyoda and Kikuyama, 2000;Wirsig-Wiechmann et al, 2002;Schubert et al, 2008). Although the expression of the receptors and G proteins has not yet been fully analyzed, V2R and Ga o expression was observed in the salamander VNO (Woodley, 2010).…”

Proteins and peptides as pheromone signals and chemical signatures

“…Soluble decapeptide pheromones are used in aquatic courtship by many amphibians, such as the Japanese Cynops newt species mentioned above and a number of anurans (Table 1; Woodley, 2010Woodley, , 2014. Among fish, peacock blenny, Salaria pavo, males may use a peptide or protein pheromone to attract females, but this has not been confirmed (Serrano et al, 2008).…”

Finding a place to live: conspecific attraction affects habitat selection in juvenile green and golden bell frogs

“…Given the suspected use of social information in habitat selection in L. aurea and the importance of chemical (Mason et al 1998;Woodley 2010) and visual communication in amphibians (Hödl and Amézquita 2001;Starnberger et al 2014), we used two-choice laboratory experiments to test the influence of visual and chemical cues of conspecifics in habitat preference of juvenile green and golden bell frogs.…”