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Abstract:
Plant volatiles are the metabolites that plants release into the air. The quantities released are not trivial. Almost one-fifth of the atmospheric CO2 fixed by land plants is released back into the air each day as volatiles. Plants are champion synthetic chemists; they take advantage of their anabolic prowess to produce volatiles, which they use to protect themselves against biotic and abiotic stresses and to provide information — and potentially disinformation — to mutualists and competitors alike. As transferors of information, volatiles have provided plants with solutions to the challenges associated with being rooted in the ground and immobile.
