Social evolution in ground and twig-nesting bees

地面和树枝筑巢蜜蜂的社会进化

• 批准号: 222883-2008
• 负责人: Richards, Miriam
• 金额: $ 1.87万
• 依托单位: Brock University
• 依托单位国家: 加拿大
• 项目类别: Discovery Grants Program - Individual
• 财政年份: 2011
• 资助国家: 加拿大
• 起止时间: 2011-01-01 至 2012-12-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nserc-crsng.gc.ca/ase-oro/Details-Detailles_eng.asp?id=478266
• 关键词: Social; evolution; ground; twig; nesting

Altruism is behaviour in which an individual sacrifices its own reproduction in order to help other individuals reproduce. How do genes for altruism spread through populations when they are at a fitness disadvantage? The puzzle is often explained by kin selection: altruists do sacrifice personal reproduction, but more than make up for it by helping to raise close relatives which share their genes. Kin selection suggests that altruism can spread through populations when altruists target their cooperative behaviour towards raising relatives, which, like their own offspring, also carry the altruist's genes. Altruistic animals live in societies, and some of the best known are those of social insects, including many species of bees. In two bee groups, the sweat bees and carpenter bees, behaviour is highly variable, from bees that are completely solitary and raise their young with no help from other bees, to egalitarian or 'communal' societies where all individuals are equally cooperative, to caste-based societies composed of selfish queens and altruistic workers. My research is geared towards explaining this variation in bee societies. I am also studying why some individual females are more likely to be altruistic than others. I am testing several theories to explain both altruism and the forms of bee societies. These theories include kin selection, the female quality hypothesis, which suggests that small, weak or infertile females are more likely to become helpers than breeders, and the environmental quality hypothesis, which suggests that bees are more likely to form societies in environments where colonies are more productive if adults cooperate. For more than 50 years, biologists have been accumulating observations on bee social diversity. The studies proposed here will allow me and my students to address important questions about animal social behaviour, questions that have preoccupied evolutionary biologists for decades, but which until recently, have not been amenable to study.

利他主义是一种行为，其中一个人牺牲自己的繁殖，以帮助其他人繁殖。当群体处于适应性劣势时，利他主义基因是如何在群体中传播的？这个难题通常可以用亲缘选择来解释：利他主义者确实牺牲了个人的繁殖能力，但通过帮助抚养拥有相同基因的近亲来弥补这一点。 亲属选择表明，当利他主义者将他们的合作行为目标对准抚养亲属时，利他主义可以在人群中传播，这些亲属就像他们自己的后代一样，也携带着利他主义者的基因。 利他的动物生活在社会中，其中最著名的是社会昆虫，包括许多种类的蜜蜂。 在两个蜜蜂群体中，汗蜂和木匠蜂，行为是高度可变的，从完全孤独的蜜蜂，在没有其他蜜蜂帮助的情况下抚养后代，到所有个体都平等合作的平等主义或“社区”社会，再到由自私的女王和利他主义工人组成的种姓社会。 我的研究是为了解释蜜蜂社会的这种变化。 我也在研究为什么有些女性比其他女性更有可能是利他主义者。 我正在测试几种理论来解释利他主义和蜜蜂社会的形式。 这些理论包括亲缘选择，雌性质量假说，这表明小，弱或不育的女性更有可能成为帮手而不是育种者，以及环境质量假说，这表明蜜蜂更有可能在环境中形成社会，如果成年人合作，蜂群更有生产力。 50多年来，生物学家一直在积累对蜜蜂社会多样性的观察。 这里提出的研究将使我和我的学生能够解决有关动物社会行为的重要问题，这些问题已经困扰了进化生物学家几十年，但直到最近，还没有适合研究。