Is sociality driven by an increased capacity for gene regulation?

群居昆虫的一个明显特征是，不同的个体在工作和生殖行为方面扮演着不同的角色，即它们属于不同的专门等级。由于不同的群居昆虫等级是从共同的遗传背景发展而来的，个体间基因活动时间和水平的差异肯定是这种行为专业化的关键。这就提出了一个问题，即这些基因调控差异是如何在个体之间产生的，以及它们是如何塑造行为多样性的。答案将为合作社会互动的出现和瓦解提供至关重要的见解。这项研究利用了在19个密切相关的蜜蜂物种内部和之间发现的社会行为的广泛自然差异。它将评估基因调控如何随着社会行为的获得和丧失而变化。该项目还将培训高中生、本科生和研究生，让他们参与研究，并将研究成果纳入正规课程。它还将通过创建“蜜蜂酒店”来帮助保护蜜蜂，并提供小册子，解释这些酒店如何帮助这些濒临灭绝的物种。这项研究将检验这一假说，即群居蜜蜂表现出比独居蜜蜂更大的转录复杂性，要么是由于基因表达的增加，要么是由于转录网络连接的变化。它还将描述群居、独居和多态蜜蜂物种中的基因调控因素，并检查对这些因素的选择模式。这些研究将评估(1)基因表达的时间和位置如何在社会形态和种姓之间变化，(2)基因共表达网络组织如何变化，以及(3)调节元件如何随着社会行为的获得和丧失而变化。这一结果将为我们理解基因调控在塑造自然行为变异和其他复杂行为中的作用提供基本的见解。这一奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力优势和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

A defining feature of social insects is the fact that different individuals play different roles with respect to work and reproductive behavior, i.e., they belong to different, specialized castes. Because the different social insect castes develop from a common genetic background, differences in the timing and levels of gene activity in individuals must be key to this behavioral specialization. This raises the question of how these gene regulatory differences come about among individuals and how they shape behavioral diversity. The answer will provide crucial insights into the emergence and break down of cooperative social interactions. This study harnesses the extensive natural variation in social behavior found within and among 19 closely-related bee species. It will assess how gene regulation changes as social behavior is gained and lost. The project will also train high school, undergraduate and graduate students by involving them in research and by integrating research results into formal courses. It will also help in bee conservation though the creation of "bee hotels" with brochures explaining how the hotels help these declining species. This research will test the hypothesis that social bees exhibit greater transcriptional complexity than solitary bees either through increased variation in gene expression and/or variation in transcriptional network connectivity. It will also characterize gene regulatory elements in social, solitary, and polymorphic bee species and examine patterns of selection on these elements. These studies will assess how (1) the timing and location of gene expression changes across social forms and castes, (2) how gene co-expression network organization changes, and (3) how regulatory elements change as social behavior is gained and lost. The results will provide fundamental insights into our understanding of the role of gene regulation in shaping natural variation in behavior and other complex traits.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.