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Science 22 May 1981:
Vol. 212. no. 4497, pp. 927 - 929
DOI: 10.1126/science.212.4497.927
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Articles

Toxicity of Angular Furanocoumarins to Swallowtail Butterflies: Escalation in a Coevolutionary Arms Race?

MAY BERENBAUM 1 and PAUL FEENY 1

1 Section of Ecology and Systematics, Division of Biological Sciences, Cornell University, Ithaca, New York 14853

Xanthotoxin, a linear furanocoumarin occurring in many plants of the family Umbelliferae, is not appreciably toxic to the umbellifer-feeding larvae of Papilio polyxenes (Lepidoptera; Papilionidae), whereas angelicin, an angular furanocoumarin found only in a few relatively advanced tribes of the Umbelliferae, reduces growth rate and fecundity. The biosynthetic pathway leading to angular attachment of the furan ring may thus have been a response within the Umbelliferae to selective pressures exerted by specialized herbivores that had adapted to feeding on linear furanocoumarins.

Submitted on November 4, 1980
Revised on January 21, 1981


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