Researchers find dual-use sexual attraction and population-control chemicals in nematodes

Organisms ranging from humans to plants to the lowliest bacterium use molecules to communicate. Some chemicals trigger the various stages of an organism's development, and still others are used to attract members of the opposite sex. Researchers at the California Institute of Technology have now found a rare kind of signaling molecule in the nematode worm Caenorhabditis elegans that serves a dual purpose, working as both a population-control mechanism and a sexual attractant.

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