Cooperation with and without Genetic Relatedness

Queller和Strassmann将研究合作和冲突Polistes Domulus，这是一种不寻常的群居黄蜂，因为它的群体既包括近亲也包括非亲属。他们将研究由DNA指纹方法确定的亲属关系对攻击性、生殖分享和利他主义帮助行为的影响程度。他们还将研究这种不寻常的遗传结构如何影响女王继承的规则，以及决定新女王的权力是掌握在一个强大的个人手中，还是掌握在数量更多的工蚁手中。这项研究延续了利用群居昆虫作为模型系统来理解生物如何被组织成合作实体的成功传统。亲属关系是合作行为最重要的相关因素之一。然而，很少有系统可以在同一个群体内比较亲属和非亲属的行为，因此，支配原虫为关键测试提供了一个独特的机会。关于女王继承的强烈冲突将使奎勒和斯特拉斯曼能够研究这种冲突是如何在合作团体中解决的。最后，由于在美国，支配小蜂是一种非本地害虫物种，了解其行为最终可能对保护本地生物多样性有用。

Queller and Strassmann will study cooperation and conflict Polistes dominulus, a social wasp that is unusual because its colonies include both close relatives and non-relatives. They will study the degree to which kinship, determined by DNA fingerprinting methods, influences aggression, reproductive sharing, and altruistic helping behavior. They will also study how this unusual genetic structure influences the rules of queen succession and whether the power to determine the new queen lie with asingle strong individual or with the more numerous workers. This study continues the successful tradition of using social insects as model systems for understanding how living things come to be organized into cooperative entities. Kinship is one of the most important correlates of cooperative behavior. Yet there have been few systems where the behavior of both relatives and non-relatives could be compared within the same colony, so P. dominulus provides a unique opportunity for critical tests. The strong conflict over queen succession will allow Queller and Strassmann to study how such conflicts are resolved in cooperative groups. Finally, because P. dominulus is a non-native pest species in the U. S., knowledge of its behavior may be useful ultimately in preserving native biodiversity.