Raspberries are a battleground between flies, yeast and fungi

The unassuming raspberry plays host to an ecological battleground, as a fly, a yeast and a fungus vie for dominance on its surface.

Raspberries produce ethylene gas as they mature, and often get colonised by Botrytis cinerea, the grey mould you find on fruit left too long in the fridge. This poses a problem for the fruit fly Drosophila suzukii, which feeds on raspberries, as its larvae are very sensitive to both the fungus and ethylene.

Now, Paul Becher at the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences (SUAS) and his…