Welcome to Alien Empire, Spring 2009.

This course is now offered as both a 2-credit (Entom 2010) and a 3-credit (Entom 2011) course. Students taking the 2-credit option will attend two lectures per week (on Monday and Wednesdays). For students taking the 3-credit option (Entom 2011) we will have a number of interactive activities during the Friday meeting. Activities will include open labs on insect diversity and behavior, a visit to the Museum of the Earth in Ithaca, full length documentary films on insect biology, and in-class debates on the role that insects play in our lives.

This course fulfills the Physical and Biological Sciences requirements for both the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences (CALS students) as well as the Arts and Sciences (A&S students). The course is open to all majors and assumes no background in biology.

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Entomology 2010/2011

Insects are the predominant form of multicellular life on earth. There are somewhere between 10 million and 30 million species of insects, and insects account for roughly 5 out of every 6 species of land animal. If aliens from another planet landed on earth, they would conclude that insects were in charge, and probably ask to speak to a beetle rather than any human. The purpose of this course is to introduce you to the astounding diversity of insects, as well as the impacts that insects have on humans.

Insects have an enormous impact on human activities. They can be pests in our crops, homes and offices. They can transmit dangerous and sometimes deadly diseases. Diseases such as yellow fever, plague, and typhus have had a major impact on human history and diseases, such as malaria, continue to impact human societies around the world. The negative impacts of insects on humans are now more and more evident as rapid global transportation allows for the spread of invasive insects from one part of the world to another. On the other hand, insects are also beneficial in that they provide important products and services. Insects are an important source of food in many societies throughout the world. Insects provide some important products and they were the first source of certain kinds of dyes, sweeteners (e.g., honey), and waxes. Insects are also the major pollinators of our crops. Insect pollination is an enormously valuable service that we often take for granted.

In order to understand the impacts of insects on humans you will need a good understanding of basic insect biology. At the beginning of the semester we will investigate how insects are constructed and how they function (lecture 2). We will then trace the major events in insect evolution, from the colonization of land, the origin of flight, and the evolution of metamorphosis (lectures 3-4). Throughout these lectures you will be introduced to the insect orders. We will then trace the basic aspects of insect biology, including mating behavior, development from egg to adult, and how insects perceive the world around them (not a trivial problem when you consider that they are encased in a hard exoskeleton; lectures 5-9). In lectures 10-12 we will turn to insect ecology and the role insects play in the natural environment, as consumers of decaying material, plants, and other insects and as pollinators. Lectures 13-16 will examine social insects, including how they have arisen, their social organization, and their behavioral complexity.

In the latter half of the course (lectures 17-28) we will investigate how insects have affected humans, both beneficially and detrimentally. We will examine insect pests, insect vectors of disease, and insect invaders. We will discuss insects as food (they are an important source of protein in many societies) as well as the important products that insects produce, such as wax, honey, and certain dyes. We will discuss the role of insects in art, literature and film as well as the important role that insects play in crime scenes (forensic entomology).