Social Biology of Ropalidia Montana, Award in Indian Currency

描述：该项目部分资助两名美国科学家，密苏里大学圣路易斯分校生物系的James Hunt博士和Robert Jeanne博士与班加罗尔印度科学研究所的R.Gadagkar博士合作在印度进行研究的实地费用。在这项研究中，将对热带群居黄蜂之一--蒙大拿刺蜂进行研究。作为为数不多的几种社会用纸黄蜂中的一种，具有离散的蜂王/工蜂二型性是很有意义的。这项研究将解决以下问题：1.该物种是否有一种报警信息素及其来源；2.在蜂群迁徙过程中，黄蜂是否使用化学物质来标记踪迹；3.雄蜂和雌蜂在与成虫交换食物时是否产生不同数量的唾液；4.幼虫如何逃离它们的蛹细胞，5.觅食工蜂任务划分的明显模式是什么？这项工作将包括选择一个黄蜂群体，并将其从高大的树木上的自然栖息地移到一个更容易进行观察的灌木区。范围：这笔小额赠款将为这两位美国科学家提供资金，让他们在印度著名的学术和研究机构之一与东道主合作，在美国人口生物学领域开展感兴趣的研究。前往印度的旅行资金是从其他来源向科学家提供的。这项研究补充了亨特博士在人口生物学项目BSR8805971的资助下所做的工作，该项目的主题是“原始社会黄蜂中的营养、特洛伊和种姓”。

Description: This project partially supports field expenses for two U.S. scientists, Dr. James Hunt and Dr. Robert Jeanne of the Department of Biology, Universiy of Missouri, St. Louis, while conducting research in India in collaboration with Dr. R. Gadagkar of the Indian Institute of Science in Bangalore. In the research, work will be done on Ropalidia montana, one of the social wasps of the tropics. It is of considerable interest as one of very few species of social paper wasps to have discrete queen/worker dimorphism. The research will address the following questions: 1. does the species have an alarm pheromone and what is its source, 2. do the wasps use chemicals to mark trails during swarm emigration, 3. do male and female larvae yield different quantities of saliva during food exchange with adults, 4. how do larvae escape their pupal cells, and 5. what is the apparent pattern of task partitioning by forager worker wasps?. This work will involve selection of a wasp colony and removing it from its natural habitat on high trees to an area of shrubs where observations can be made more easily. Scope: This small grant will provide funds for the two U.S. scientists to conduct research of interest, to the U.S., in the area of population biology and with the collaboration of their host at one of India's prestigeous academic and research institutes. Funds for travel to India were made available to the scientists from other sources. This research complements work being done by Dr. Hunt under a grant BSR8805971 from the Population Biology Program on "Nourishment, Trophallaxis and Caste in Primitvely Social Wasps".