Division of labor in a clonal ant

劳动分工是大多数从简单实体到更复杂实体的进化过渡成功的基础。虽然导致多细胞生物细胞分化的机制已经被很好地理解，但对昆虫社会劳动分工的研究只是缓慢地超越了仅仅是描述性的阶段。在这个项目中，我们的目标是确定在一个非常简单的模型系统中带来（生殖）分工的近似机制，克隆蚂蚁Platythyrea punctata，其中所有个体在遗传和形态上都是相同的。我们打算确定，在幼虫发育期间或羽化后不久，哪些社会和环境条件会影响个体开始繁殖或接管非繁殖任务的倾向。我们将明确关注被认为在具有形态等级的物种中起作用的因素，如营养和工蜂/幼虫比例，以及成虫羽化后不久的社会互动。这些行为研究和实验操作的结果应该通过比较个体之间的基因表达来补充，这些个体由于其先前的历史，可能成为生殖或非生殖。我们期望通过我们的调查，我们将大大有助于我们对社会昆虫劳动分工的基本原则的理解。

Division of labor underlies the success of most evolutionary transitions from simple to more complex entities. While the mechanisms leading to cell differentiation in multi-cellular organisms are quite well understood, research on division of labor in insect societies has only slowly moved beyond a merely descriptive stage. In this project, we aim at determining proximate mechanisms that bring about (reproductive) division of labor in a very simple model system, the clonal ant Platythyrea punctata, in which all individuals are genetically and morphologically identical. We intend to determine, which social and environmental conditions during larval development or shortly after eclosion affect the propensity of an individual to start reproducing or to take over non-reproductive tasks. We will focus explicitly on factors that are believed to play a role in species with morphological castes, such as nutrition and worker / larvae ratio, and on social interactions shortly after adult emergence. Results from these behavioral studies and experimental manipulations shall be complemented by comparisons of gene expression among individuals, which, because of their previous history, likely become reproductives or non-reproductives. We expect that through our investigations we will significantly contribute to our understanding of the fundamental principles that underlie division of labor in socialinsects.