There has been a dearth of research elucidating the behavioral effect of microbially-produced volatile organic compounds on insects in postharvest agriculture. Demonstrating attraction to MVOC’s by stored product insects would provide an additional source of unique behaviorally-relevant stimuli to protect postharvest commodities at food facilities. Here, we assessed the behavioral response of a primary (Rhyzopertha dominica) and secondary (Tribolium castaneum) grain pest to bouquets of volatiles produced by whole wheat that were untempered, or tempered to 12%, 15%, or 19% grain moisture and incubated for 9, 18, or 27 days. We hypothesized that MVOC’s may be more important for the secondary feeder because they signal that otherwise unusable, intact grains have become susceptible by weakening of the bran. However, contrary to our expectations, we found that the primary feeder, R. dominica, but not T. castaneum was attracted to MVOC’s in a wind tunnel experiment, and in a release-recapture assay using commercial traps baited with grain treatments. Increasing grain moisture resulted in elevated grain damage detected by near-infrared spectroscopy and resulted in small but significant differences in the blend of volatiles emitted by treatments detected by gas chromatography coupled with mass spectrometry (GC–MS). In sequencing the microbial community on the grain, we found a diversity of fungi, suggesting that an assemblage was responsible for emissions. We conclude that R. dominica is attracted to a broader suite of MVOC’s than T. castaneum, and that our work highlights the importance of understanding insect-microbe interactions in the postharvest agricultural supply chain.
The literature on the urban environment and physical and psychological health has steadily increased over the last decade. This paper aims to offer a better understanding of the state of the literature on assessing the urban environment and mental health by mapping the field of research through a scoping review and illuminating emerging trends and future research using bibliometric analysis. Uniquely, this study drew 495 articles from four distinct journal databases (PubMed, Scopus, Web of Science, and ProQuest), whereas traditional bibliometric analyses draw from a single source. The results show trends of a consistent increase in research on the topic over the last decade. Research published on this topic is fragmented with a consistent but isolated focus on physical health, mental health, and environmental characteristics. Overall, most attention has been given to assessing the impacts of urban environments on physical activity and general health, while less research has focused on mental health assessments and urban environments. This study concludes by highlighting gaps and making recommendations for future research in the field. Prominent gaps are related to using interdisciplinary and scalable approaches to understanding the relationship between urban environments and mental health.
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