The evolutionary transition of the agricultural pest Drosophila suzukii to egg laying on ripe fruits was paralleled with several gustatory innovations.

An integrative model of coordinated crawling in fruit fly maggots links neuromuscular dynamics to body-substrate mechanics in the presence of proprioceptive feedback.

Ribosomes translate through stop codons far more often than previously thought, yielding C-terminally extended proteins in a variety of eukaryotes.

Olfactory neurons of insects, once thought to express only a single type of olfactory receptor, exhibit widespread co-expression of receptors from multiple chemosensory gene families.

Differences in the usage of DNA repair pathways may give rise to the unique patterns of Y-linked mutations that, together with natural selection, shape rapid Y chromosome evolution.

Evolution strictly preserves telomere stability but rapidly diversifies telomere length regulation in Drosophila.

The insect dopaminergic system serves an important function in the regulation of ontogenesis and early development, contributing to the evolutionary processes that limit the ecological niche of Drosophila sechellia.

Heterochromatic sequences evolve rapidly, as do ZAD-ZNF genes-encoding proteins involved in heterochromatin functions, explaining why evolutionarily dynamic ZAD-ZNF genes are more likely to be essential in Drosophila.

An analysis of within-host bacterial proliferation reveals that minor "stochastic" variation in the ability of the innate immune response to control bacterial growth early on can result in either survival or death of the host.

Genome wide association analyses in a wild-derived Drosophila melanogaster population uncover extensive variation in cuticular hydrocarbon composition, which may present a target for natural selection and adaptive evolution.