The evolution of non-reproductive workers in insect colonies with haplodiploid genetics
- Harvard University, United States
- Emmanuel College, United States
Abstract
Eusociality is a distinct form of biological organization. A key characteristic of advanced eusociality is the presence of non-reproductive workers. Why evolution should produce animals that sacrice their own reproductive potential in order to aid others is an important question in evolutionary biology. Here we provide a detailed analysis of the selective forces that determine the emergence and stability of non-reproductive workers. We study the effects, in situations where the queen of the colony has mated once or several times, of recessive and dominant sterility alleles acting in her offspring. Contrary to widespread belief based on heuristic arguments of genetic relatedness, non-reproductive workers can easily evolve in polyandrous species. The crucial quantity is the functional relationship between a colony's reproductive rate and the fraction of sterile workers present in that colony. We derive precise conditions for natural selection to favor the evolution of non-reproductive workers.
Article and author information
Author details
Reviewing Editor
- Michael Doebeli, University of British Columbia, Canada
Version history
- Received: May 21, 2015
- Accepted: October 20, 2015
- Accepted Manuscript published: October 20, 2015 (version 1)
- Version of Record published: February 3, 2016 (version 2)
Copyright
© 2015, Olejarz et al.
This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License permitting unrestricted use and redistribution provided that the original author and source are credited.
Metrics
-
- 4,178
- views
-
- 657
- downloads
-
- 21
- citations
Views, downloads and citations are aggregated across all versions of this paper published by eLife.
Download links
A two-part list of links to download the article, or parts of the article, in various formats.
Downloads (link to download the article as PDF)
Open citations (links to open the citations from this article in various online reference manager services)
Cite this article (links to download the citations from this article in formats compatible with various reference manager tools)
The evolution of non-reproductive workers in insect colonies with haplodiploid genetics
eLife 4:e08918.
https://doi.org/10.7554/eLife.08918
Further reading
-
How can natural selection favor the evolution of non-reproductive worker ants?
-
- Ecology
- Epidemiology and Global Health
Zoonotic disease dynamics in wildlife hosts are rarely quantified at macroecological scales due to the lack of systematic surveys. Non-human primates (NHPs) host Plasmodium knowlesi, a zoonotic malaria of public health concern and the main barrier to malaria elimination in Southeast Asia. Understanding of regional P. knowlesi infection dynamics in wildlife is limited. Here, we systematically assemble reports of NHP P. knowlesi and investigate geographic determinants of prevalence in reservoir species. Meta-analysis of 6322 NHPs from 148 sites reveals that prevalence is heterogeneous across Southeast Asia, with low overall prevalence and high estimates for Malaysian Borneo. We find that regions exhibiting higher prevalence in NHPs overlap with human infection hotspots. In wildlife and humans, parasite transmission is linked to land conversion and fragmentation. By assembling remote sensing data and fitting statistical models to prevalence at multiple spatial scales, we identify novel relationships between P. knowlesi in NHPs and forest fragmentation. This suggests that higher prevalence may be contingent on habitat complexity, which would begin to explain observed geographic variation in parasite burden. These findings address critical gaps in understanding regional P. knowlesi epidemiology and indicate that prevalence in simian reservoirs may be a key spatial driver of human spillover risk.
