Prehibernating aggregations of Polistes dominulus: an occasion to study early dominance assessment in social insects

Dapporto, Leonardo; Palagi, Elisabetta; Cini, Alessandro; Turillazzi, Stefano

doi:10.1007/s00114-006-0104-3

Cited by 20 publications

(19 citation statements)

References 9 publications

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“…Gene description Pearson R P-value young age relative to the other groups; some ovarian activation has been observed in gynes found in aggregations preparing to overwinter in Polistes dominulus (Dapporto et al, 2006). In general, the slightly higher level of ovary development we found in workers compared to gynes, supports the hypothesis that workers are in a "reproduce now" physiological state (Hunt and Amdam, 2005;Hunt, 2007;Hunt et al, 2007) that is repressed by social interactions with other individuals, including the queen and dominant workers (Pardi, 1948) as well as the larvae (Marchal, 1897;Hunt, 2007).…”

Section: Physiology-gene Correlationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Lipid stores, ovary development, and brain gene expression in Polistes metricus females

et al. 2008

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In order to gain insights into the mechanistic basis of caste and behavioral differences in Polistes paper wasps, we examined abdominal lipid stores and ovary development in Polistes metricus females in four groups: foundresses, queens, workers, and gynes. Queens had the largest ovaries, followed by foundresses, workers, and gynes. Gynes had 6x higher lipid stores than the other groups, and lipid stores were lower in foragers (foundresses, workers) than non-foragers (queens, gynes). Lipid levels and ovary development were negatively correlated across the four groups, but removing gynes from the analysis revealed a significant positive correlation for foundresses, workers, and queens, suggesting different energy allocation strategies for gynes vs. other groups. Expression levels of 9 genes (including three in the insulin pathway), examined in a previous study, correlated with either lipid stores or ovary development. These correlative results suggest important relationships between nutrition, reproduction, and division of labor in primitively social insects. We also show that it is possible to assign P. metricus females to one of the four female groups on the basis of wing wear (an indicator of foraging experience), lipid stores, and ovary development, which can facilitate caste-specific collections for future studies.

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Section: Physiology-gene Correlationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Lipid stores, ovary development, and brain gene expression in Polistes metricus females

et al. 2008

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“…6), which often coincides with behavioral quiescence (20), has been speculated to underlie characteristics of gyne offspring in the paper wasp genus Polistes (21-24), a social insect that lacks discrete morphological castes (25). However, the occurrence of early gynes (26) and late workers (27) in Polistes (5) argues against the role of conventional ambient variables, such as photoperiod or temperature, as diapause cues in this taxon. Instead, experimental evidence points to nourishment: low vs. high food levels during rearing in a common laboratory environment led to putative worker and gyne phenotypes, respectively, as confirmed by differential survival of a cold test (28,29).…”

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confidence: 99%

A diapause pathway underlies the gyne phenotype inPolisteswasps, revealing an evolutionary route to caste-containing insect societies

Hunt

Kensinger

Kossuth

et al. 2007

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

146

125

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Colonies of social wasps, ants, and bees are characterized by the production of two phenotypes of female offspring, workers that remain at their natal nest and nonworkers that are potential colony reproductives of the next generation. The phenotype difference includes morphology and is fixed during larval development in ants, honey bees, and some social wasps, all of which represent an advanced state of sociality. Paper wasps (Polistes) lack morphological castes and are thought to more closely resemble an ancestral state of sociality wherein the phenotype difference between workers and nonworkers is established only during adult life. We address an alternative hypothesis: a bias toward the potential reproductive (gyne) phenotype among Polistes female offspring occurs during larval development and is based on a facultatively expressed ancestral life history trait: diapause. We show that two signatures of diapause (extended maturation time and enhanced synthesis and sequestration of a hexameric storage protein) characterize the development of gyne offspring in Polistes metricus. Hexameric storage proteins are implicated in silencing juvenile hormone signaling, which is a prerequisite for diapause. Diverging hexamerin protein dynamics driven by changes in larval provisioning levels thereby provide one possible mechanism that can cause an adaptive shift in phenotype bias during the Polistes colony cycle. This ontogenetic basis for alternative female phenotypes in Polistes challenges the view that workers and gynes represent behavior options equally available to every female offspring, and it exemplifies how social insect castes can evolve from casteless lineages.caste development ͉ hexameric storage proteins ͉ juvenile hormone ͉ life-history pleiotropy ͉ social behavior S ocial insects often show pronounced differences in behavior, physiology, and morphology between castes of workers (functionally sterile helpers) and reproductives (1).

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“…Variation in nutrient inflow can translate into two distinct phenomena known in Polistes: a minor peak of early gynes (21) and a minor peak of late workers ( Fig. 3B) (22).…”

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confidence: 99%

“…These now can be seen as G1 and G2 females whose behavioral tuning reflects underlying bivoltine phenotypes. Early gynes (21) and late workers (22) show that G1 and G2 phenotype expression in Polistes is cued to colony conditions, which typically change in a seasonal pattern, rather than to seasonal environmental variation itself. Individual-and colony-level responses to nutrition manipulations (14,24), as well as our simulation results, support this explanation.…”

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Bivoltinism as an Antecedent to Eusociality in the Paper Wasp Genus Polistes

Hunt

Amdam

2005

Science

164

147

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To learn the evolutionary trajectories of caste differentiation in eusocial species is a major goal of sociobiology. We present an explanatory framework for caste evolution in the eusocial wasp genus Polistes (Vespidae), which is a model system for insect eusocial evolution. We hypothesize that Polistes worker and gyne castes stem from two developmental pathways that characterized the bivoltine life cycle of a solitary ancestor. Through individual-based simulations, we show that our mechanistic framework can reproduce colony-level characteristics of Polistes and, thereby, that social castes can emerge from solitary regulatory pathways. Our explanatory framework illustrates, by specific example, a changed perspective for understanding insect social evolution.The essence of eusociality in Polistes wasps is the differentiation of female offspring into two castes: nonreproductive females that work in their natal colony and reproductive gynes that found colonies in the next nesting cycle (1). Differentiation of Polistes offspring into workers and gynes has been proposed to rely on physiological events that are triggered after adults emerge from pupation (2). A more widely held view, however, is that caste in social wasps is determined, or at least predisposed, during larval development (3). Larval nourishment is believed to play a role in caste differentiation (1,3), but the nature of this mechanism has not been determined. More importantly, no hypothesis addresses how a nutritional cue would translate into specific traits that characterize the two castes.Regulatory machineries that control sequential shifts between phases in the life cycles of solitary insects may have been co-opted during social evolution (4). From this perspective, caste evolution can be envisioned as a remodeling process that uses solitary control circuits to build social phenotypes. The regulatory layout of a presocial form would thus become the ground plan that underlies the evolutionary design of its social descendants. One such layout may be the bivoltine life cycle, an adaptation to seasonal environments that may be tropical wet/dry as well as temperate warm/cold. Bivoltine life cycles have a first generation that undergoes uninterrupted development and reproduction, followed by a second generation that enters prepupal or adult diapause, passes the unfavorable season, and reproduces the following year. (The prepupa resides inside the pupal cocoon and is a quiescent state of the last larval instar.) The biology of wasps in the vespid subfamily Eumeninae can have major explanatory implications for the evolutionary trajectories of sociality in Vespidae (5). Bivoltinism occurs

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Prehibernating aggregations of Polistes dominulus: an occasion to study early dominance assessment in social insects

Cited by 20 publications

References 9 publications

Lipid stores, ovary development, and brain gene expression in Polistes metricus females

Lipid stores, ovary development, and brain gene expression in Polistes metricus females

A diapause pathway underlies the gyne phenotype inPolisteswasps, revealing an evolutionary route to caste-containing insect societies

Bivoltinism as an Antecedent to Eusociality in the Paper Wasp Genus Polistes

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