Plants and predators pick same poison

Caterpillars and their hosts independently evolved identical recipe for cyanide

There’s a patent war pending over the invention of the cyanide bomb.

GRAZERS BEWARE Nibble on bird’s-foot trefoil, a plant in the pea family, and you’ll get a mouthful of poisonous cyanide, which dissuades most grazers. A caterpillar known to safely munch on the plant can make cyanide of its own, having independently evolved the same instructions and cellular machinery that the plant uses, scientists now show.