Table 2.
Electroscutumography (ESG) responses of intact ticks (N = 21) to a series of attractant VOCs. Responses are displayed as marginal means and 95% confidence intervals estimated from a model that included tick number as a random factor to account for repeated measurements of each individual. The responses were log-transformed before the model and post-hoc tests, and here we display back-transformed estimates on the original scaled measurement (in mV).
| VOC | Number of Carbons | 1 Functional Groups | mV | 95% CI | Tukey’s |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2n-Hexane | 6 | SH | 2.0 | (1.2, 3.3) | a |
| Pentanal | 5 | SH; A | 1.8 | (1.1, 2.9) | a |
| Octanal | 8 | SH; A | 1.8 | (1.1, 3.0) | a |
| Lactic acid | 3 | SH; CA; H | 2.1 | (1.3, 3.4) | a |
| Heptanal | 7 | SH; A | 2.6 | (1.6, 4.3) | a |
| Hexanal | 6 | SH; A | 5.0 | (3.1, 8.1) | b |
| NH3 | - | - | 6.5 | (4.0, 10.6) | bc |
| Hexanoic acid | 6 | SH; CA | 6.6 | (4.1, 10.8) | bc |
| Butanal | 4 | SH; A | 8.4 | (5.1, 13.6) | c |
| Isovaleric acid | 5 | SH; CA | 13.8 | (8.5, 22.6) | d |
| Isobutyric acid | 4 | SH; CA | 18.3 | (11.2, 29.9) | de |
| Butyric acid | 4 | SH; CA | 18.5 | (11.3, 30.2) | de |
| Propionic acid | 3 | SH; CA | 26.4 | (16.1, 43.0) | e |
1 A = aldehyde (-COH); H = hydroxyl (-OH); CA = carboxylic acid (-COOH); SH = saturated hydrocarbon. 2 Three hexane (control) puffs were presented at the beginning, middle, and end of each series of recordings, and the results were averaged for each tick.