Insect Diapause

Our highly seasonal world restricts insect activity to brief portions of the year. This feature necessitates a sophisticated interpretation of seasonal changes and enactment of mechanisms for bringing development to a halt and then reinitiating it when the inimical season is past. The dormant state of diapause serves to bridge the unfavourable seasons, and its timing provides a powerful mechanism for synchronizing insect development. This book explores how seasonal signals are monitored and used by insects to enact specific molecular pathways that generate the diapause phenotype. The broad perspective offered here scales from the ecological to the molecular and thus provides a comprehensive view of this exciting and vibrant research field, offering insights on topics ranging from pest management, evolution, speciation, climate change and disease transmission, to human health, as well as analogies with other forms of invertebrate dormancy and mammalian hibernation.

Table of Contents:
1. Confronting the challenges of a seasonal environment; 2. What seasons are being avoided?; 3. Variation in the diapause response; 4. The cost of diapause and some diapause alternatives; 5. Interpreting seasonal cues to program diapause entry; 6. Preparing for diapause; 7. The diapause state; 8. Ending diapause and reinitiating development; 9. Molecular signaling pathways that regulate diapause; 10. Genetic control of diapause; 11. Evolution of diapause; 12. Wider implications; References; Index.

Review :
'Insect Diapause guides the reader through an expansive library of historic and recent discoveries towards a synthesis of how diapause works, how it evolves, and how it might be the key to insect resilience or decline … Denlinger makes it relatively easy to navigate a complex series of experiments … [and] is adept at tracing the common thread without obscuring the variability and uncertainty of the results … Insect Diapause provides a much-needed synthesis of modern diapause research and should find a home on the shelves of many entomologists. It covers a lot of territory yet throughout it reveals fertile ground for a new generation of breakthroughs in diapause biology.' Greg Ragland, American Entomologist 'Denlinger is a world leader in the study of insect diapause. The volume is heavily referenced and up to date. The book is appropriate for both experienced researchers and graduate students.' Goggy Davidowitz, The Quarterly Review of Biology 'Insect Diapause is a long awaited and excellent new monograph summarising basics and recent achievements of what we know about such a fascinating phenomenon as insect diapause. A must-read.' Dmitri L. Musolin, Royal Entomological Society (www.royensoc.co.uk)