Brunner, Elisabeth and Trindl, Andreas and Falk, Karl H. and Heinze, Juergen and D'Ettorre, Patrizia (2005) Reproductive conflict in social insects: Male production by workers in a slave-making ant. EVOLUTION, 59 (11). pp. 2480-2482. ISSN 0014-3820, 1558-5646
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In insect societies, workers cooperate but may also pursue their individual interests, such as laying viable male eggs. The case of obligatory slave-making ants is of particular interest because workers do not engage in maintenance activities and foraging. Therefore, worker egg laying is expected to be less detrimental for colony efficiency than in related, nonparasitic species. Furthermore, as slave-making workers usually do not perform brood care and thus might have little power in manipulating sex allocation, they might be more strongly selected to increase their direct fitness by producing their own sons than workers in nonparasitic species. In this study we investigated worker reproduction in four natural colonies of the slave-making ant Polyergus rufescens, using highly variable microsatellite markers. Our results show that workers produce up to 100% of the males. This study thus presents the first direct evidence of an almost complete takeover of male reproduction by workers in ants.
| Item Type: | Article |
|---|---|
| Uncontrolled Keywords: | MICROSATELLITE LOCI; HYMENOPTERA; FORMICIDAE; RELATEDNESS; POLYERGUS; BEHAVIOR; kin conflict; reproductive conflict; slave-making ants; social insects; worker reproduction |
| Subjects: | 500 Science > 590 Zoological sciences |
| Divisions: | Biology, Preclinical Medicine > Institut für Zoologie > Zoologie/Evolutionsbiologie (Prof. Dr. Jürgen Heinze) |
| Depositing User: | Dr. Gernot Deinzer |
| Date Deposited: | 23 Apr 2021 10:26 |
| Last Modified: | 23 Apr 2021 10:26 |
| URI: | https://pred.uni-regensburg.de/id/eprint/35464 |
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