Frontiers A recent study in Frontiers in Sustainable Food Systems shows that the fruits of a type of tomato plant send electrical signals to the rest of the plant when they are infested by caterpillars. Plants have a multitude of chemical and hormonal signaling pathways, which are generally transmitted through the sap (the nutrient-rich water that moves through the plant). In the case of fruits, nutrients flow exclusively to the fruit and there has been little research into whether there is any communication in the opposite direction–i.e. from fruit to plant. “We usually forget that a plant’s fruits are living and semiautonomous parts of their mother-plants, far more complex than we currently think. Since fruits are part of the plant, made of the same tissues of the leaves and stems, why couldn’t they communicate with the plant, informing it about what they are experiencing, just like regular leaves do?” says first author Dr Gabriela Niemeyer Reissig, of the Federal University of Pelotas, Brazil. “What we found is that fruits can share important information such as caterpillar attacks–which is a serious issue for a plant–with the rest of the plant, and that can probably prepare other parts of the plant for the same attack.”