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Study

R. H. Wright Lectures on Insect Olfaction

Kaissling, Karl-Ernst

Simon Fraser University, 1987

Book or monographnarrative reviewlaboratory

What they did

Synthesises electrophysiological recordings from individual sensory hairs on the antenna of the silk moth, establishing the response of single receptor cells to the female pheromone bombykol and the number of molecules required to elicit a behavioural response.

Studied in
Bombyx mori
Sample size
lecture series synthesising electrophysiological work on moth antennae

What they found

A single receptor cell responds to the capture of a single pheromone molecule, and behavioural responses follow from a small number of such captures across the antenna within a short interval.

What it means

The authors' reading, and ours. Where they differ, that difference is the point.

How the authors put it

Moth pheromone detection operates at the physical limit of chemical sensitivity — the individual molecule.

How NatureHQ reads it

Single-molecule sensitivity is the fact everybody quotes, and the interesting part is what it does not buy. Detecting one molecule does not let a moth find a female kilometres away by following a gradient, because at that distance the pheromone arrives as isolated filaments with nothing in between. The antenna is a superb detector attached to a flight strategy — fly upwind while the signal is present, cast crosswind when it is lost — and it is the strategy rather than the sensitivity that covers the distance.

Limitations

  • A lecture synthesis rather than a primary paper, cited for the standard account it established.
  • One species, and one exceptionally well-studied pheromone system.
  • Threshold measurements under controlled airflow do not translate directly to field range.

The experiment, explained

  • Recording from one hair on a moth’s antenna

    How little of a scent does a moth need in order to detect it?

What this study is used for on NatureHQ

One study can inform several subjects. Here is everywhere this one is cited.

Finding the paper

Published by: Academic book publishersPublished as an academic monograph.

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NatureHQ summarises research in its own words and does not reproduce published text. Reviewed 2026-09-02.