Haplodiploidy: the great evolutionary innovation of the Hymenoptera

这个项目的目的是找出导致卵子孤雌生殖的关键基因。雌蜂是雌性克隆自己的能力(处女出生)，广泛分布于膜翅目，包括蜜蜂、黄蜂和蚂蚁。膜翅目昆虫之所以重要，是因为它促进了生活史上的一些重大转变，特别是社会寄生。处女生育的能力是许多蚂蚁物种入侵的核心，并使蜜蜂患上社会性癌症(杀死蜂群的寄生虫)。这个项目的好处是，该基因的识别应该有助于识别潜在的入侵蚂蚁物种，并有助于防止影响南非商业养蜂业的社会癌症在世界范围内传播。

This project aims to identify a key gene that causes thelytokous parthenogenesis. Thelytoky is the ability of a female to clone herself (virgin birth), and is wide spread in the Hymenoptera which include bees, wasps and ants. Hymenopteran thelytoky is important because it facilitates some major transitions in life history, particularly social parasitism. The capacity for virgin birth is central to the invasiveness of many ant species, and enables social cancers (parasitic workers that kill colonies) in bees. The benefit of this project is that the identification of the gene should help identify potentially invasive ant species and help prevent the social cancers that affect commercial beekeeping in South Africa from spreading world-wide.