A long‐standing goal for biologists and social scientists is to understand the factors that lead to the evolution and maintenance of co‐operative behaviour between conspecifics. To that end, the fruit fly, Drosophila melanogaster, is becoming an increasingly popular model species to study sociality; however, most of the research to date has focused on adult behaviours. In this study, we set out to examine group‐feeding behaviour by larvae and to determine whether the degree of relatedness between individuals mediates the expression co‐operation. In a series of assays, we manipulated the average degree of relatedness in groups of third‐instar larvae that were faced with resource scarcity, and measured the size, frequency and composition of feeding clusters, as well as the fitness benefits associated with co‐operation. Our results suggest that larval D. melanogaster are capable of kin recognition (something that has not been previously described in this species), as clusters were more numerous, larger and involved more larvae, when more closely related kin were present in the social environment. These findings are discussed in the context of the correlated fitness‐associated benefits of co‐operation, the potential mechanisms by which individuals may recognize kin, and how that kinship may play an important role in facilitating the manifestation of this co‐operative behaviour.
On the expression of co-operative feeding behaviour in 3 rd instar Drosophila 1 melanogaster larvae. 2 3 Abstract: Under poor nutritional conditions, 3 rd instar Drosophila melanogaster 18 larvae will work collaboratively in feeding clusters to obtain resources that 19 cannot be reached individually. To better understand the conditions that 20 influence the expression of this behaviour we examined the frequencies, the size 21 and the membership in vials of flies that were initially seeded with either 100 or 22200 eggs each using flies from both a large, outbred population and a replicate 23 population that was homozygous for the bw allele. Overall, more feeding 24 clusters, containing more larval participants were observed in the higher density 25 vials compared to the lower density vials, consistent with the idea that this social 26 behaviour is a response to dwindling resources in the environment. The 27presence of the bw allele did not result in greater egg-to-adult mortality, nor did 28 it result in lower participation in feeding clusters. 29 30
Behaviors are often influenced by both ecology and genetics. Perez et al. tested whether display patterns and the ecology of different species of fiddler crabs influence synchronous waving and whether this a phylogenetic phenomenon. They found that there was no phylogenetic signal in wave display synchronicity, and suggested that signal structure, microhabitat complexity, and different mating systems might instead be the cause. These results support the non‐phylogenetic nature of synchronicity that can be observed across animal taxa.
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