Friend virus (FV) and lactate dehydrogenase-elevating virus (LDV) are endemic mouse viruses that can cause long-term chronic infections in mice. We found that numerous mouse-passaged FV isolates also contained LDV and that coinfection with LDV delayed FV-specific CD8 ؉ T-cell responses during acute infection. While LDV did not alter the type of acute pathology induced by FV, which was severe splenomegaly caused by erythroproliferation, the immunosuppression mediated by LDV increased both the severity and the duration of
JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org.. abstract: Because of their role in mediating life-history trade-offs, hormones are expected to be strongly associated with components of fitness; however, few studies have examined how natural selection acts on hormonal variation in the wild. In a songbird, the dark-eyed junco (Junco hyemalis), field experiments have shown that exogenous testosterone alters individuals' resolution of the survival-reproduction trade-off, enhancing reproduction at the expense of survival.Here we used standardized injections of gonadotropin-releasing hormone (GnRH) to assay variation in the testosterone production of males. Using measurements of annual survival and reproduction, we found evidence of strong natural selection acting on GnRH-induced increases in testosterone. Opposite to what would be predicted from the survival-reproduction trade-off, patterns of selection via survival and reproduction were remarkably similar. Males with GnRHinduced testosterone production levels that were slightly above the population mean were more likely to survive and also produced more offspring, leading to strong stabilizing selection. Partitioning reproduction into separate components revealed positive directional selection via within-pair siring success and stabilizing selection via extrapair mating success. Our data represent the most complete demonstration of natural selection on hormones via multiple fitness components, and they complement previous experiments to illuminate testosterone's role in the evolution of life-history trade-offs.
Bateman's principle, which states that male reproductive success should increase with multiple mating, whereas female reproductive success should not, has long been used to explain sex differences in behavior. The statistical relationship between mating success and reproductive success, or Bateman gradient, has been proposed as a way to quantify sex differences in sexual selection. We used a long-term data set on the distribution of paternity in the socially monogamous dark-eyed junco to examine the effect of multiple mating on lifetime reproductive success and to determine the relative contributions of within-pair and extra-pair mating. Both sexes exhibited a strong positive Bateman gradient, even when the number of breeding years was accounted for. Although theory suggests that this pattern indicates a strong potential for sexual selection in both sexes, we argue that the interpretation of strong Bateman gradients, particularly in females, has many potential complications. We discuss several alternative explanations for our results, none of which requires sexual selection acting on female traits, including targeting of inherently fecund females by males seeking extra-pair mates and increased power to detect extra-pair offspring as family size increases. Because neither of these explanations requires that increased mating success causes increased reproductive success, we conclude that using Bateman gradients to measure the potential for sexual selection may be misleading for some mating systems and life histories, such as the iteroparous social monogamy found in juncos.DEPOSIT STATEMENT: This is a pre-copyedited, author-produced PDF of an article accepted for publication in 'Behavioral Ecology' following peer review. The version of record is available online at:10.1093/beheco/ars077.
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