Reciprocal Effects of Female Choice and Male Traits in Poecilia Reticulata

第二性征在动物中很常见，而雄性特征有时发展得如此强烈，以至于表现出不适应。在一个特定的种群中，是什么导致了雄性特征和雌性偏好的特定组合？为什么种群会进化出不同的特征组合？研究者们在几个层面上解决了这个问题：雌性选择的机制，雌性选择对种群内颜色模式进化的影响，以及检验（从性选择理论）种群中雌性选择标准和雄性特征共同分化的预测。这是与新墨西哥州立大学的Anne Houde的合作研究成果。他们提议明确测试性选择理论的两个主要预测。首先，他们将研究男性特征和女性选择的相互进化。其次，他们提出探索感官驱动过程的影响，以及它如何与男性特征和女性选择的进化相互作用。为了做到这一点，他们建议进行三个长期的选择实验，这将导致女性偏好和男性特征的长期遗传变化。一项实验选择男性特征，并寻找女性偏好的进化。另一种是选择女性的偏好（通过光谱敏感性的选择），并寻找男性特征的进化。第三种是通过改变环境光的颜色和捕食者的颜色视觉来改变（雌性和捕食者）对颜色模式的感知，并寻找雄性特征和雌性偏好的变化。在性选择和捕食的影响下，研究人员提出的继续工作将对影响雌性选择和雄性次要性状的长期联合遗传变化的过程产生不同寻常的完整理解。

Secondary sexual traits are common in animals, and male traits are sometimes so strongly developed that they appear maladaptive. What causes a particular combination of male traits and female preferences in a given population, and why do populations evolve different combinations of traits? The investigators are addressing this question in the guppy at several levels: the mechanisms of female choice, the effects of female choice on the evolution of color patterns within populations, and testing the prediction (from sexual selection theory) of co-divergence of female choice criteria and male traits among populations. This is a collaborative research effort with Anne Houde, New Mexico State University. They propose to explicitly test two major predictions from sexual selection theory. First, they will investigate the reciprocal evolution of male traits and female choice. Second, they propose to explore the effects of the sensory drive process, and how this interacts with the evolution of male traits and female choice. In order to do this, they propose to carry out three long-term selection experiments which should lead to long term genetic changes in female preferences and male traits. One experiment selects for male traits and looks for evolution of female preferences. Another selects for female preferences (via selection on spectral sensitivity) and looks for evolution of male traits. The third modifies the perception of color patterns (to females and predators) by varying ambient light color and predator color vision, and looks for changes in male traits and female preferences. The proposed continuation of the investigators work will yield an unusually complete understanding of the processes which affect the long term joint genetic change of female choice and secondary male traits under the influence of sexual selection and predation.