A halictid bee with sympatric solitary and eusocial nests offers evidence for Hamilton's rule

Yagi, Norihiro; Hasegawa, Eisuke

doi:10.1038/ncomms1939

Cited by 29 publications

(46 citation statements)

References 39 publications

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“…In halictid bees, the degree of relatedness asymmetry is different between colonies with founding queens and colonies in which the queens are dead and replaced by daughters resulting in split sex ratios between the two types of colonies [27][28][29] . In addition, worker laying of male eggs in the eusocial Hymenoptera affects relatedness asymmetry and influences sex allocation 30 .…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Sex ratio biases in termites provide evidence for kin selection

et al. 2013

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Inclusive fitness theory, also known as kin selection theory, is the most general expansion of Darwin's natural selection theory. It is supported by female-biased investment by workers in the social Hymenoptera where relatedness to sisters is higher than to brothers because of haplodiploidy. However, a strong test of the theory has proven difficult in diploid social insects because they lack such relatedness asymmetry. Here we show that kin selection can result in sex ratio bias in eusocial diploids. Our model predicts that allocation will be biased towards the sex that contributes more of its genes to the next generation when sex-asymmetric inbreeding occurs. The prediction matches well with the empirical sex allocation of Reticulitermes termites where the colony king can be replaced by a queen's son. Our findings open broad new avenues to test inclusive fitness theory beyond the well-studied eusocial Hymenoptera.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Sex ratio biases in termites provide evidence for kin selection

et al. 2013

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“…In eusocial halictids, the potential for worker reproduction is well known, and in almost all known eusocial species, dissections of workers or genetic studies of relatedness suggest the potential for worker reproduction (Packer and Knerer 1985, Packer and Owen 1994, Paxton et al 2002, Yagi and Hasegawa 2012. Several of these studies indicate that relatively large numbers of workers have developing ovaries but that queens are often highly successful at preventing worker maternity, probably because they remove most worker-laid eggs by eating them (Michener and Brothers 1974).…”

Section: Are There Two Kinds Of Workers In Halictus Ligatus?mentioning

confidence: 99%

Phenological, but not social, variation associated with climate differences in a eusocial sweat bee, Halictus ligatus, nesting in southern Ontario

Richards¹,

Onuferko²,

Rehan³

2015

JHR

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Studies of annual and geographic variation in eusocial bee populations suggest that more stringent environmental conditions result in stronger reproductive skew favouring queens, while moderate conditions favour increasing worker reproduction. To test these predictions, we compared the phenology and colony development of H. ligatus nesting in St. Catharines, Ontario, Canada to a previously studied aggregation 90 km north of St. Catharines, in Victoria, Ontario. Despite the close proximity of these two locations, St. Catharines has markedly shorter winters and longer summers. Comparisons between St. Catharines in 2006 and Victoria in the 1980s and 1990s incorporate both geographic differences in climate and temporal differences due to climate change. We predicted that St. Catharines foundress queens should emerge from hibernation and initiate nests earlier in spring, giving them time to produce more workers. Since earlier studies indicated that queens have difficulty suppressing worker reproduction in larger colonies, we also predicted higher rates of worker ovarian development in St. Catharines. In spring and summer 2006, we excavated 65 H. ligatus nests, comparing their contents to 713 specimens collected in pan traps. As predicted, nests were initiated about a month earlier in St. Catharines than in Victoria, but contrary to prediction, fewer workers were produced in St. Catharines. St. Catharines workers were just as likely to have developed ovaries as Victoria workers. About 40% of St. Catharines workers were classified as reproductive, and larger reproductive workers tended to have higher ovarian scores. RESEARCH ARTICLEMiriam H. Richards et al. / Journal of Hymenoptera Research 43: 19-44 (2015) 20 evidence that queens can initiate new nests following the loss of their first brood, overlap between worker and gyne production within some nests, and high rates of independent nest founding by worker-sized females, suggesting that many worker-brood females overwinter. Overall, the distinctly warmer climate of St. Catharines compared to Victoria led to earlier nest initiation and lengthening of the flight season, but not to the predicted differences in colony social organisation or queen-worker reproductive skew. A second objective of our study was to assess how well pan trap collections capture important information about demographic and social parameters important in assessing social variability in sweat bees. Nest excavations and pan traps produced similar results, suggesting that pan traps are a good alternative when nest excavations are impossible.

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“…This reduced the relatedness ratio, but without there being an obvious overall correlation between relatedness and b/c ratios (blue arrows). Measuring b/c ratios is impossible in the obligatorily eusocial domain, because there is no longer a joint currency of independent personal reproduction, as there is in the cooperative and facultatively eusocial breeders who remain under selection to continuously evaluate the Hamiltonian inequality and adjust their individual commitment decisions accordingly [103,162,163]. (b) Possible variation in reproductive skew when evolution proceeds from solitary to cooperative breeding and vice versa, and in some lineages to eusocial breeding as an irreversible transition.…”

Section: Vertebrates Were Never Monogamous Enough To Have Evolved Oblmentioning

confidence: 99%

Beyond promiscuity: mate-choice commitments in social breeding

Boomsma

2013

Phil. Trans. R. Soc. B

124

162

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Obligate eusociality with distinct caste phenotypes has evolved from strictly monogamous sub-social ancestors in ants, some bees, some wasps and some termites. This implies that no lineage reached the most advanced form of social breeding, unless helpers at the nest gained indirect fitness values via siblings that were identical to direct fitness via offspring. The complete lack of re-mating promiscuity equalizes sex-specific variances in reproductive success. Later, evolutionary developments towards multiple queen-mating retained lifetime commitment between sexual partners, but reduced male variance in reproductive success relative to female's, similar to the most advanced vertebrate cooperative breeders. Here, I (i) discuss some of the unique and highly peculiar mating system adaptations of eusocial insects; (ii) address ambiguities that remained after earlier reviews and extend the monogamy logic to the evolution of soldier castes; (iii) evaluate the evidence for indirect fitness benefits driving the dynamics of (in)vertebrate cooperative breeding, while emphasizing the fundamental differences between obligate eusociality and cooperative breeding; (iv) infer that lifetime commitment is a major driver towards higher levels of organization in bodies, colonies and mutualisms. I argue that evolutionary informative definitions of social systems that separate direct and indirect fitness benefits facilitate transparency when testing inclusive fitness theory.

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A halictid bee with sympatric solitary and eusocial nests offers evidence for Hamilton's rule

Cited by 29 publications

References 39 publications

Sex ratio biases in termites provide evidence for kin selection

Sex ratio biases in termites provide evidence for kin selection

Phenological, but not social, variation associated with climate differences in a eusocial sweat bee, Halictus ligatus, nesting in southern Ontario

Beyond promiscuity: mate-choice commitments in social breeding

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