Arginine vasotocin and androgen pathways are associated with mating system variation in North American cichlid fishes

Oldfield, Ronald G.; Harris, Rayna M.; Hendrickson, Dean A.; Hofmann, Hans A.

doi:10.1016/j.yhbeh.2013.04.006

Cited by 26 publications

(21 citation statements)

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“…mone function. 11-KT is the major androgen in many fish species (Borg 1994), and it is typically increased in dominant males, as seen here in the elevated 11-KT in nesting males relative to sneakers and satellites (Oliveira et al 2001;Maruska & Fernald 2010a,b;Oldfield et al 2013;Taves et al 2009). Testosterone levels did not vary among phenotypes, which is a common finding among fish species given the role of 11-KT as the functional analog for T (but see Desjardins et al 2008;Parikh et al 2006;Trainor & Hofmann 2006;Taves et al 2009;Renn et al 2012 which represent exceptions to this general pattern, all from Cichlidae species).…”

Section: Number Of Genes Up or Down Regulated Relative To All Other Pmentioning

confidence: 55%

Neural Gene Expression Profiles and Androgen Levels Underlie Alternative Reproductive Tactics in the Ocellated Wrasse, Symphodus ocellatus

et al. 2014

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Discrete variation in reproductive behavior and physiology is observed in diverse taxa. Although it is known that most within‐sex alternative reproductive tactics arise as a consequence of phenotypic plasticity, relatively little is known about differential neural gene expression among plastic alternative reproductive phenotypes. In the ocellated wrasse Symphodus ocellatus, males exhibit one of three alternative tactics (nesting, satellite, and sneaker) within a reproductive season, but switch tactics between years. Satellites and sneakers spawn parasitically in dominant (nesting) males' nests, but only nesting males provide parental care. Nesting and satellite males show transient cooperative defense of nests against sneakers. Here, we analyze circulating sex steroid hormone levels and neural gene expression profiles in these three male phenotypes and in females. 11‐ketotestosterone (but not testosterone) was highest in nesting males, while estradiol was highest in females. Brain transcriptomes of satellites and females were most similar to each other and intermediate to nesting and sneaker males. Sneakers showed more total expression differences, whereas nesting males showed higher magnitude expression differences. Our findings reveal the surprising extent to which neural gene expression patterns vary across reproductive tactics that vary in a number of social traits, including aggression, territoriality, and cooperation, providing important insights into the molecular mechanisms that may underlie variation in cooperative and reproductive behavior.

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Section: Number Of Genes Up or Down Regulated Relative To All Other Pmentioning

confidence: 55%

Neural Gene Expression Profiles and Androgen Levels Underlie Alternative Reproductive Tactics in the Ocellated Wrasse, Symphodus ocellatus

et al. 2014

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“…Aubin-Horth et al (2007) showed that dominant individuals of N. pulcher had higher levels of whole-brain avt gene expression, compared to subordinate conspecifics, and its expression is higher in wildcaught males of the social cichlid N. pulcher than that of the nonsocial cichlid Telmatochromis temporalis (O'Connor et al 2015), but this difference was not repeated in a laboratory study (O'Connor et al 2016). The V1a2 receptor for avt (avtr) is implicated in social behaviour in fish by mediating aggressive and mating behaviour (Lema 2010;Kline et al 2011;Huffman et al 2012bHuffman et al , 2015Oldfield et al 2013).…”

Section: Candidate Genesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Effect of the early social environment on behavioural and genomic responses to a social challenge in a cooperatively breeding vertebrate

et al. 2017

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The early social environment can have substantial, lifelong effects on vertebrate social behaviour, which can be mediated by developmental plasticity of brain gene expression. Early-life effects can influence immediate behavioural responses towards later-life social challenges and can activate different gene expression responses. However, while genomic responses to social challenges have been reported frequently, how developmental experience influences the shape of these genomic reaction norms remains largely unexplored. We tested how manipulating the early social environment of juvenile cooperatively breeding cichlids, Neolamprologus pulcher, affects their behavioural and brain genomic responses when competing over a resource. Juveniles were reared either with or without a breeder pair and a helper. Fish reared with family members behaved more appropriately in the competition than when reared without. We investigated whether the different social rearing environments also affected the genomic responses to the social challenge. A set of candidate genes, coding for hormones and receptors influencing social behaviour, were measured in the telencephalon and hypothalamus. Social environment and social challenge both influenced gene expression of egr-1 (early growth response 1) and gr1 (glucocorticoid receptor 1) in the telencephalon and of bdnf (brain-derived neurotrophic factor) in the hypothalamus. A global analysis of the 11 expression patterns in the two brain areas showed that neurogenomic states diverged more strongly between intruder fish and control fish when they had been reared in a natural social setting. Our results show that same molecular pathways may be used differently in response to a social challenge depending on early-life experiences.

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“…Importantly, these attributes can differentially affect group members. For example, habitat structure, resource distribution, or risk of predation and parasitism, can differentially influence the behavior of dominant and subordinate, or male and female, group mates [57]. Such parameters can also influence the distribution and behavior of one sex, which in turn can affect the behavior of the opposite sex [58].…”

Section: Conceptual Relationships Between Mechanisms and Functionmentioning

confidence: 99%

An evolutionary framework for studying mechanisms of social behavior

Hofmann

Beery

Blumstein³

et al. 2014

Trends in Ecology & Evolution

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Social interactions are central to most animals and have a fundamental impact upon the phenotype of an individual. Social behavior (social interactions among conspecifics) represents a central challenge to the integration of the functional and mechanistic bases of complex behavior. Traditionally, studies of proximate and ultimate elements of social behavior have been conducted by distinct groups of researchers, with little communication across perceived disciplinary boundaries. However, recent technological advances, coupled with increased recognition of the substantial variation in mechanisms underlying social interactions, should compel investigators from divergent disciplines to pursue more integrative analyses of social behavior. We propose an integrative conceptual framework intended to guide researchers towards a comprehensive understanding of the evolution and maintenance of mechanisms governing variation in sociality.The study of social behavior in the 21st century All animals interact with conspecifics at some point in their lives. Members of the same species tend to be each other's fiercest competitors and strongest allies, as evidenced by the intense cooperation and conflict that characterize many intraspecific interactions [1]. These interactions are the products of genetic, epigenetic, endocrine, and neural mechanisms that -in conjunction with environmental conditions -affect Darwinian fitness and evolve via natural selection. Building upon Aristotle's four questions, Tinbergen [2] posited that understanding behavior requires the integration of studies of mechanism and function. Only by asking questions both from a proximate perspective (i.e., focusing on causation and development) and an ultimate perspective (i.e., focusing on adaptive value and evolutionary descent) can behavior be fully understood. Social behavior in particular lends itself to such an integrative approach not only because it commands the attention of many disciplines [3] but also because even many behaviors commonly considered nonsocial often occur in a social context (e.g., mating, fighting, parental care). Social behavior is also special because the selective agents are other members of the same species, and this results in intriguing evolutionary dynamics. Nevertheless, in the intervening decades since Tinbergen's

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Arginine vasotocin and androgen pathways are associated with mating system variation in North American cichlid fishes

Cited by 26 publications

References 76 publications

Neural Gene Expression Profiles and Androgen Levels Underlie Alternative Reproductive Tactics in the Ocellated Wrasse, Symphodus ocellatus

Neural Gene Expression Profiles and Androgen Levels Underlie Alternative Reproductive Tactics in the Ocellated Wrasse, Symphodus ocellatus

Effect of the early social environment on behavioural and genomic responses to a social challenge in a cooperatively breeding vertebrate

An evolutionary framework for studying mechanisms of social behavior

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