Testing the costs and benefits of polyandry using twelve Drosophila species

为什么有些生殖模式尽管对女性的健康造成了代价，但仍然持续存在？非人类动物雌性社会行为变异的进化后果尚不清楚，但对于理解为什么种群内某些交配模式比其他模式更常见很重要。研究人员将完成对多个果蝇物种（模式生物）中雌性行为和人口统计学变化的比较实验研究，这些物种的系统发育关系和生态学是已知的，但社会和交配行为未知。研究人员将从野外收集苍蝇，培养它们，并在实验室进行对照实验，以评估多次交配是否对雌性及其后代的健康有益;雌性将被允许与一个或多个雄性交配一次或多次，并测量雌性及其后代的健康。数据将被保存到一个在线存储库，到FLYBASE，并可在发表的论文合著的本科生合作者，博士后助理，和高级人员。本科生参与者将作为研究合作伙伴，在更广泛的影响活动中为计划性企业做出实质性和协作性的贡献，科学研究沉浸，这是研究的一个组成部分，旨在向学生介绍从项目实施，执行，数据采集，分析，主要报告制作，并在提交给科学期刊之前对同事的批评做出回应。这项研究将为有效检验假设提供大量数据集，产生一般性见解。因此，它是重要的，在提供对照实验数据比较的角度来看，一个普遍的难题，目前无法回答其他较长寿命的模式生物或人类。

Why do some reproductive patterns persist despite their costs to the health of females? The evolutionary consequences of social behavior variation of nonhuman-animal females are unknown, but important for understanding why some patterns of mating within populations are more common than others. The investigators will complete a comparative experimental study of behavioral and demographic variation of females in multiple species of Drosophila (model organisms) for which phylogenetic relationships and ecology are known, but social and mating behavior unknown. The investigators will collect flies from the wild, culture them and perform controlled experiments in the laboratory to evaluate whether multiple matings confer benefits to the health of females and their offspring; females will be allowed to mate only one time or multiple times with one or multiple males and the health of the females and their offspring will be measured. Data will be deposited to an online repository, to FLYBASE, and available in published papers coauthored by undergraduate collaborators, postdoctoral associates, and senior personnel. Undergraduate participants will contribute substantially and collaboratively as research partners to the programmatic enterprise in a broader impacts activity, a scientific research immersion, that is an integrated part of the research, designed to introduce students to experimental research science from project implementation, execution, data acquisition, analysis, primary-report production, and response to the critiques of their colleagues before submission to scientific journals. The study will provide large data sets for efficient testing of hypotheses, producing general insights. Thus, it is important in providing controlled experimental data in comparative perspective about a general puzzle, currently unanswerable in other longer-lived model organisms or humans.