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Animals · Animal ethology · Comparative psychology · Animal models · Outline · Index
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Cat pheromones are pheromones that are used by cats and other felids for cat communication.
Feline facial pheromone[]
Feline facial pheromone is a hypothetical pheromone used by cats to mark places, objects, and persons as familiar by rubbing their face on surfaces. It is currently not known if there actually exists a "feline facial pheromone" and what its chemical structure is.
A preparation that claims to mimic the feline facial pheromone is commercially available under the name Feliway.[1] This product contains Valeriana officinalis essential oil as attractant, mixed with common fatty acids as fixative.[2] Valeriana officinalis is known for its behavioural effects on cats, similar to Nepeta (catnip).
"Cat attractants"[]
A domestic cat demonstrating the effects of catnip such as rolling, pawing, and frisking
Cat attractants are odorants and constituents of essential oils that have an effect on cat behavior. A cat presented with a cat attractant may roll in it, paw at it, or chew on the source of the smell. The effect is usually relatively short, lasting for only a few minutes after which the cats have a refractory period during which the response cannot be elicited. After 30 minutes to two hours, susceptible cats gain interest again.
The volatile chemicals that are currently known to cause these behavioral effects in cats are actinidine from Valeriana officinalis, nepetalactone from Nepeta (catnip), dihydronepetalactone, neonepetalactone, isodihydronepetalactone, epinepetalactone, boschnialactone, boschniakine, dihydroactinidiolide, actinidiolide, iridomyrmecin, (-)-mitsugashiwalactone, and onikulactone.[3][4]
Cat urine odorants[]
| Cat urine-like odorants | |||||||||
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Cat urine, especially that of male cats, contains the putative cat pheromone 3-mercapto-3-methylbutan-1-ol (MMB), a compound that gives cat urine its typical odor. The MMB precursor felinine is synthesized in the urine from 3-methylbutanol-cysteinylglycine (3-MBCG) by the excreted peptidase cauxin. Felinine then slowly degrades into the volatile MMB.[5]
Rats and mice are highly aversive to the odor of a cat's urine, but after infection with the parasite Toxoplasma gondii, they are attracted by it, highly increasing the likelihood of being preyed upon and of infecting the cat.[6]
| Chemical structure of felinine | → Chemical structure of 3-mercapto-3-methylbutan-1-ol |
| Felinine | MMB |
See also[]
- Pheromone
- Catnip
References[]
- ↑ Feliway official web site Feliway official web site
- ↑ Patent US5709863 Properties of cats' facial pheromones
- ↑ Zhao YP, Wang XY, Wang ZC, Lu Y, Fu CX, Chen SY (September 2006). Essential oil of Actinidia macrosperma, a catnip response kiwi endemic to China. J Zhejiang Univ Sci B 7 (9): 708–12.
- ↑ Tucker AO, Tucker SS (1988). Catnip and the catnip response. Economic Botany 42 (2): 214–31.
- ↑ M. Miyazaki, T. Yamashita, Y. Suzuki, Y. Saito, S. Soeta, H. Taira, and A. Suzuki (October 2006). A major urinary protein of the domestic cat regulates the production of felinine, a putative pheromone precursor. Chem. Biol. 13 (10): 1071–9.
- ↑ M Berdoy, J P Webster, and D W Macdonald (2000). Fatal attraction in rats infected with Toxoplasma gondii. Proc Biol Sci. 267 (1452): 1591–4.
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