Everyone loves a butterfly but few are as enchanted with the lowly moth. Yet these muted insects lost in the shadows may have more smarts. Eons ago they quit the daytime and found it safer to chase ...

Although a flower's bouquet can be composed of hundreds of chemicals, the tobacco hornworm moth needs to smell just a handful to identify its favorite source of nectar, the sacred datura flower. It is ...

Pollution can play havoc with pollinators’ favorite flower smells. But one kind of moth can learn how to take to an unfamiliar new scent like, well, a moth to a flame. That ability may imply that the ...

PORTLAND, ORE. — A great flower shape for a moth trying to get a drink in the dark turns out to be awful from the plant’s point of view. Offering hawk moths (Manduca sexta) a range of 3-D printed ...

To make the discovery, researchers put hawkmoths in front of robotic flowers in low light. The moths slowed their visual system down to collect more light over long periods of time, the researchers ...

A white-lined sphinx moth hovers at dusk while sipping from the nectar-rich blooms of garden verbena 'Homestead Purple'. (Rick Wetherbee) There's something magical about the hours of darkness that ...

Byproducts of car exhaust disrupt pollination by degrading the floral scents that insects use to track down their favorite plants, according to new research. By Lauren Leffer Published Feb 8, 2024 ...

Scientists have demonstrated that hawk moths acquired the highest energy gain when they visited flowers that matched the length of their proboscis. The moths were supported in their choice of the best ...

Moths need just the essence of a flower's scent to identify it, according to new research from The University of Arizona in Tucson. Although a flower's odor can be composed of hundreds of chemicals, a ...

Max Planck researchers show that Manduca sexta recognizes the scent of flowers matching its proboscis and thereby optimizes energy gain Charles Darwin, the founder of the theory of evolution, was an ...