Libersat’s group has focused its research on figuring out what the jewel wasp does to the cockroach mind. The mother jewel wasp performs something like brain surgery. She uses her stinger to feel around for the right part of her victim’s brain. Once found, she then injects a zombifying venom.
When Libersat removed the targeted parts of a roach’s brain, the wasp would feel around what was left of the roach’s brain with her stinger for 10 to 15 minutes. “If the brain was present, [the wasp] would take less than a minute,” he notes. This shows that the wasp can sense the right place to inject its poison.
That venom might interfere with a chemical in the roach’s brain called octopamine, Libersat reports. This chemical helps the cockroach stay alert, walk and perform other tasks. When researchers injected a substance similar to octopamine into zombie cockroaches, the insects again began walking.
Libersat cautions, however, that this is likely just one piece of the puzzle. There is still work to do to understand the chemical process happening in the cockroach’s brain, he says. But Weinersmith, who was not involved in the research, notes that Libersat’s team has worked out this chemical process in more detail than is available for most types of zombie mind control.