Floral fragrances waft far
and wide in clean air, but polluted air is another story.
Emissions from sources such as cars and power plants are
destroying the perfumed chemical trails that direct pollinators
to flowers. This sort of environmental interference might
contribute to a recently observed reduction in pollinating
insects such as bees, according to a new study from researchers
at the University of Virginia (Atmos. Environ. 2008, 42,
2336).
Environmental sciences professor Jose D. Fuentes and graduate
students Quinn S. McFrederick and James C. Kathilankal created
a model to assess what happens in the wind when linalool,
ß-myrcene, and ß-ocimene—volatile hydrocarbon
compounds and common flower scents—meet atmospheric
pollutants such as ozone and hydroxyl and nitrate radicals.
The researchers based the model on the snapdragon, a flower
whose aroma cocktail includes all three compounds, and found
that the scents degraded quickly with distance from the
source.
Prior to the 1880s, insects could detect scents up to a
few kilometers away, but under today’s more polluted
conditions, the researchers find, insects can’t detect
scents farther than 200 meters away. That could become a
big problem for the survival of pollinators and isolated
flower patches, the scientists warn.
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