Social Contracts and Sex Allocation Theory in an Annual, Eusocial Wasp

一年生真社会黄蜂的社会契约和性别分配理论

• 批准号: 9808788
• 负责人: Peter Nonacs
• 金额: $ 6.2万
• 依托单位: University of California-Los Angeles
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 1998
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 1998-09-01 至 2002-08-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=9808788&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Social; Contracts; Sex; Allocation; Theory

Nonacs 9808788 Wasp nests in the genus Polistes are often initiated by several cooperating females. Such nests grow to considerably larger sizes than nests initiated by a single wasp. However, most of the offspring are the progeny of one dominant female, which leads to a question of why do the other females accept their subordinate status rather than nest on their own. One explanation is the theory of 'social contracts', where dominants cede to subordinates a fraction of the reproduction as incentive to stay and help. That is they allow the subordinates to rear some of their own young. This fraction can be either in sons or daughters, which makes the social contract dependent also on the sex ratio produced by the entire nest. However, sex ratios are potentially affected by environment as well as social interactions taking place on the nest. Experimental manipulation of wasp nests in the field and genetic analysis of foundresses and offspring in the laboratory will directly measure the lifetime reproductive success of subordinate wasps and test several theoretical models of sex allocation. Wasps exhibit complicated social interactions and have extensive parental care for their young not unlike birds and mammals. Therefore the theoretical insights resulting from this research are relevant for many social species. Furthermore, the wasps' greater abundance and ease of observation makes them an ideal model system for testing general questions about social evolution and parental behavior. A better understanding of the colony initiation process will also have practical considerations in pest control.

Nonacs 9808788 Polistes属中的黄蜂巢通常由几个合作的女性发起。与单个黄蜂发起的巢相比，这种巢的大小要大得多。但是，大多数后代是一个主导女性的后代，这导致了一个问题，为什么其他女性接受其从属地位而不是独自筑巢。一种解释是“社会契约”的理论，在该理论中，主导地位将繁殖的一小部分作为留下和帮助的动机。那就是他们允许下属养育自己的一些年轻人。这部分可以是儿子或女儿，这也使社会契约也取决于整个巢穴所产生的性别比。但是，性别比可能受到环境以及巢穴发生的社交互动的影响。实验室中对黄蜂巢的实验操纵和实验室中的遗传分析将直接测量下属黄蜂的终生生殖成功，并测试几种性别分配的理论模型。 黄蜂表现出复杂的社交互动，并为年轻的幼鸟和哺乳动物提供了广泛的父母护理。因此，这项研究产生的理论见解与许多社会物种有关。 此外，黄蜂的更大丰度和易于观察使它们成为测试有关社会进化和父母行为的一般问题的理想模型系统。对殖民地起始过程的更好理解也将在害虫控制方面具有实际考虑。