Do high females produce high quality sons? Maternal effects on fitness and fitness-related traits of male offspring in a social mammal

地位高的女性会生出品质高的儿子吗？

• 批准号: 133283098
• 负责人: Dr. Oliver Höner
• 金额: --
• 依托单位: Leibniz-Institut für Zoo- und Wildtierforschung (IZW)
• 依托单位国家: 德国
• 项目类别: Research Grants
• 财政年份: 2009
• 资助国家: 德国
• 起止时间: 2008-12-31 至 2011-12-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://gepris.dfg.de/gepris/projekt/133283098?language=en
• 关键词: Do; females; produce; quality; sons

Natural selection operates on traits that are heritable and influence the fitness of individuals. The study of fitness-related traits, of factors that influence these traits and of their heritability is thus fundamental to our understanding of evolutionary processes. Individual phenotypic traits are shaped by the individual’s genotype, environmental effects it experiences during development, or a combination of both. Because in mammals, the environment during development is provided mainly by the mother, female mammals are likely to have a strong impact on the physical and social development of their offspring. Maternal effects on fitness and fitness-related traits of male offspring however have never been investigated in mammals living under natural selection pressures in their natural environment. Here I propose to investigate the relationship between the phenotypic quality of females and the fitness and fitness-related traits of their male offspring in free-ranging spotted hyenas. The study will reveal whether social status and experience, the two most important determinants of female quality in spotted hyenas and many other social mammals, influence the fitness of offspring of the dispersing sex, how female quality transfers into offspring fitness and whether fitness-related traits influenced by maternal effects are heritable. A comparison of maternal effects on fitness and heritability of fitness-related traits of male hyenas, female hyenas and females of other species may further reveal whether maternal effects depend on characteristics such as the dispersal pattern and dominance relationships within and between the sexes.

自然选择作用于可遗传的特征并影响个体的适应性。因此，对与健康相关的特征、影响这些特征的因素及其遗传力的研究对于我们理解进化过程至关重要。个体表型特征是由个体的基因型、发育过程中经历的环境影响或两者的组合决定的。因为在哺乳动物中，发育过程中的环境主要由母亲提供，雌性哺乳动物很可能对其后代的身体和社会发展产生强烈影响。然而，从未在自然环境中生活在自然选择压力下的哺乳动物中研究过母体对雄性后代健康和健康相关特征的影响。在这里，我建议研究自由放养斑鬣狗中雌性表型质量与其雄性后代的健康和健康相关特征之间的关系。该研究将揭示社会地位和经验（斑鬣狗和许多其他群居哺乳动物中雌性品质的两个最重要的决定因素）是否会影响分散性后代的适应性，雌性品质如何转化为后代的适应性，以及受母体效应影响的适应性相关特征是否可遗传。比较雄性鬣狗、雌性鬣狗和其他物种的雌性对健康和健康相关性状遗传力的母性影响可能会进一步揭示母性影响是否取决于性别内部和性别之间的扩散模式和优势关系等特征。