scholarly journals Monogamy promotes altruistic sterility in insect societies

2018 ◽  
Vol 5 (5) ◽  
pp. 172190 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nicholas G. Davies ◽  
Andy Gardner
Keyword(s):  
Population Genetics ◽  
Inclusive Fitness ◽  
Stable States ◽  
Genetic Constraints ◽  
Inclusive Fitness Theory ◽  
Insect Societies ◽  
Extended Analysis ◽  
Evolution Of Eusociality ◽  
The Stability ◽  
Worker Sterility

Monogamy is associated with sibling-directed altruism in multiple animal taxa, including insects, birds and mammals. Inclusive-fitness theory readily explains this pattern by identifying high relatedness as a promoter of altruism. In keeping with this prediction, monogamy should promote the evolution of voluntary sterility in insect societies if sterile workers make for better helpers. However, a recent mathematical population-genetics analysis failed to identify a consistent effect of monogamy on voluntary worker sterility. Here, we revisit that analysis. First, we relax genetic assumptions, considering not only alleles of extreme effect—encoding either no sterility or complete sterility—but also alleles with intermediate effects on worker sterility. Second, we broaden the stability analysis—which focused on the invasibility of populations where either all workers are fully sterile or all workers are fully reproductive—to identify where intermediate pure or mixed evolutionarily stable states may occur. Third, we consider a broader range of demographically explicit ecological scenarios relevant to altruistic worker non-reproduction and to the evolution of eusociality more generally. We find that, in the absence of genetic constraints, monogamy always promotes altruistic worker sterility and may inhibit spiteful worker sterility. Our extended analysis demonstrates that an exact population-genetics approach strongly supports the prediction of inclusive-fitness theory that monogamy promotes sib-directed altruism in social insects.

scholarly journals Monogamy promotes worker sterility in insect societies

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nicholas G. Davies ◽  
Andy Gardner
Keyword(s):  
Population Genetics ◽  
Social Insects ◽  
Inclusive Fitness ◽  
Stable States ◽  
Inclusive Fitness Theory ◽  
Insect Societies ◽  
Extended Analysis ◽  
Key Driver ◽  
The Stability ◽  
Worker Sterility

AbstractInclusive-fitness theory highlights monogamy as a key driver of altruistic sib-rearing. Accordingly, monogamy should promote the evolution of worker sterility in social insects when sterile workers make for better helpers. However, a recent population-genetics analysis (Olejarzet al.2015) found no clear effect of monogamy on worker sterility. Here, we revisit this analysis. First, we relax genetic assumptions, considering not only alleles of extreme effect—encoding either no sterility or complete sterility—but also alleles with intermediate worker-sterility effects. Second, we broaden the stability analysis—which focused on the invasibility of populations where either all workers are fully-sterile or all workers are fully-reproductive—to identify where intermediate pure or mixed evolutionarily-stable states may occur. Finally, we consider additional, demographically-explicit ecological scenarios relevant to worker non-reproduction. This extended analysis demonstrates that an exact population-genetics approach strongly supports the prediction of inclusive-fitness theory that monogamy promotes sib-directed altruism in social insects.

scholarly journals The validity and value of inclusive fitness theory

2011 ◽  
Vol 278 (1723) ◽  
pp. 3313-3320 ◽  
Author(s):  
Andrew F. G. Bourke
Keyword(s):  
Kin Selection ◽  
Evolutionary Biology ◽  
Social Evolution ◽  
Inclusive Fitness ◽  
Evidence Base ◽  
Alternative Theory ◽  
Selection Theory ◽  
Inclusive Fitness Theory ◽  
Evolution Of Eusociality ◽  
Natural Selection Theory

Social evolution is a central topic in evolutionary biology, with the evolution of eusociality (societies with altruistic, non-reproductive helpers) representing a long-standing evolutionary conundrum. Recent critiques have questioned the validity of the leading theory for explaining social evolution and eusociality, namely inclusive fitness (kin selection) theory. I review recent and past literature to argue that these critiques do not succeed. Inclusive fitness theory has added fundamental insights to natural selection theory. These are the realization that selection on a gene for social behaviour depends on its effects on co-bearers, the explanation of social behaviours as unalike as altruism and selfishness using the same underlying parameters, and the explanation of within-group conflict in terms of non-coinciding inclusive fitness optima. A proposed alternative theory for eusocial evolution assumes mistakenly that workers' interests are subordinate to the queen's, contains no new elements and fails to make novel predictions. The haplodiploidy hypothesis has yet to be rigorously tested and positive relatedness within diploid eusocial societies supports inclusive fitness theory. The theory has made unique, falsifiable predictions that have been confirmed, and its evidence base is extensive and robust. Hence, inclusive fitness theory deserves to keep its position as the leading theory for social evolution.

scholarly journals Power over reproduction in social Hymenoptera

2003 ◽  
Vol 358 (1438) ◽  
pp. 1741-1753 ◽  
Author(s):  
Madeleine Beekman ◽  
Francis L. W. Ratnieks
Keyword(s):  
Inclusive Fitness ◽  
Information Access ◽  
Hierarchical Level ◽  
Mating Frequency ◽  
Social Hymenoptera ◽  
Reproductive Characteristics ◽  
Inclusive Fitness Theory ◽  
Insect Societies ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
The One

Inclusive fitness theory has been very successful in predicting and explaining much of the observed variation in the reproductive characteristics of insect societies. For example, the theory correctly predicts sex–ratio biasing by workers in relation to the queen's mating frequency. However, within an insect society there are typically multiple reproductive optima, each corresponding to the interest of different individual(s) or parties of interest. When multiple optima occur, which party's interests prevail? Presumably, the interests of the party with the greatest ‘power’; the ability to do or act. This article focuses on factors that influence power over colony reproduction. In particular, we seek to identify the principles that may cause different parties of interest to have greater or lesser power. In doing this, we discuss power from two different angles. On the one hand, we discuss general factors based upon non–idiosyncratic biological features (e.g. information, access to and ability to process food) that are likely to be important to all social Hymenoptera. On the other hand, we discuss idiosyncratic factors that depend upon the biology of a taxon at any hierarchical level. We propose that a better understanding of the diversity of reproductive characteristics of insect societies will come from combining inclusive fitness theory with a wide range of other factors that affect relative power in a conflict situation.

scholarly journals The evolution of extreme altruism and inequality in insect societies

2009 ◽  
Vol 364 (1533) ◽  
pp. 3169-3179 ◽  
Author(s):  
Francis L. W. Ratnieks ◽  
Heikki Helanterä
Keyword(s):  
Life Cycle ◽  
Inclusive Fitness ◽  
Phylogenetic Analyses ◽  
Stingless Bee ◽  
Insect Societies ◽  
Honeybee Colony ◽  
Evolution Of Eusociality ◽  
Two Stages ◽  
Food Workers ◽  
Social Coercion

In eusocial organisms, some individuals specialize in reproduction and others in altruistic helping. The evolution of eusociality is, therefore, also the evolution of remarkable inequality. For example, a colony of honeybees ( Apis mellifera ) may contain 50 000 females all of whom can lay eggs. But 100 per cent of the females and 99.9 per cent of the males are offspring of the queen. How did such extremes evolve? Phylogenetic analyses show that high relatedness was almost certainly necessary for the origin of eusociality. However, even the highest family levels of kinship are insufficient to cause the extreme inequality seen in e.g. honeybees via ‘voluntary altruism’. ‘Enforced altruism’ is needed, i.e. social pressures that deter individuals from attempting to reproduce. Coercion acts at two stages in an individual's life cycle. Queens are typically larger so larvae can be coerced into developing into workers by being given less food. Workers are coerced into working by ‘policing’, in which workers or the queen eat worker-laid eggs or aggress fertile workers. In some cases, individuals rebel, such as when stingless bee larvae develop into dwarf queens. The incentive to rebel is strong as an individual is the most closely related to its own offspring. However, because individuals gain inclusive fitness by rearing relatives, there is also a strong incentive to ‘acquiesce’ to social coercion. In a queenright honeybee colony, the policing of worker-laid eggs is very effective, which results in most workers working instead of attempting to reproduce. Thus, extreme altruism is due to both kinship and coercion. Altruism is frequently seen as a Darwinian puzzle but was not a puzzle that troubled Darwin. Darwin saw his difficulty in explaining how individuals that did not reproduce could evolve, given that natural selection was based on the accumulation of small heritable changes. The recognition that altruism is an evolutionary puzzle, and the solution was to wait another 100 years for William Hamilton.

scholarly journals Formalizing Darwinism and inclusive fitness theory

2009 ◽  
Vol 364 (1533) ◽  
pp. 3135-3141 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alan Grafen
Keyword(s):  
Population Genetics ◽  
Natural Selection ◽  
Building Block ◽  
Inclusive Fitness ◽  
Theoretical Work ◽  
Mathematical Framework ◽  
Basic Building Block ◽  
Formal Darwinism ◽  
Inclusive Fitness Theory ◽  
Fitness Maximization

Inclusive fitness maximization is a basic building block for biological contributions to any theory of the evolution of society. There is a view in mathematical population genetics that nothing is caused to be maximized in the process of natural selection, but this is explained as arising from a misunderstanding about the meaning of fitness maximization. Current theoretical work on inclusive fitness is discussed, with emphasis on the author's ‘formal Darwinism project’. Generally, favourable conclusions are drawn about the validity of assuming fitness maximization, but the need for continuing work is emphasized, along with the possibility that substantive exceptions may be uncovered. The formal Darwinism project aims more ambitiously to represent in a formal mathematical framework the central point of Darwin's Origin of Species , that the mechanical processes of inheritance and reproduction can give rise to the appearance of design, and it is a fitting ambition in Darwin's bicentenary year to capture his most profound discovery in the lingua franca of science.

Social Evolution, Hamilton’s Rule, and Inclusive Fitness

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Samir Okasha
Keyword(s):  
Social Behaviour ◽  
Social Evolution ◽  
Inclusive Fitness ◽  
Popular Approach ◽  
Hamilton’S Rule ◽  
Inclusive Fitness Theory ◽  
The Social ◽  
Social Encounters ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Hamilton's Rule

Inclusive fitness theory, originally due to W. D. Hamilton, is a popular approach to the study of social evolution, but shrouded in controversy. The theory contains two distinct aspects: Hamilton’s rule (rB > C); and the idea that individuals will behave as if trying to maximize their inclusive fitness in social encounters. These two aspects of the theory are logically separable but often run together. A generalized version of Hamilton’s rule can be formulated that is always true, though whether it is causally meaningful is debatable. However, the individual maximization claim only holds true if the payoffs from the social encounter are additive. The notion that inclusive fitness is the ‘goal’ of individuals’ social behaviour is less robust than some of its advocates acknowledge.

scholarly journals Inclusive Fitness Theory from Darwin to Hamilton

Genetics ◽  
2007 ◽  
Vol 176 (3) ◽  
pp. 1375-1380
Author(s):  
Lee Alan Dugatkin
Keyword(s):  
Inclusive Fitness ◽  
Inclusive Fitness Theory

scholarly journals War and peace: social interactions in infections

2014 ◽  
Vol 369 (1642) ◽  
pp. 20130365 ◽  
Author(s):  
Helen C. Leggett ◽  
Sam P. Brown ◽  
Sarah E. Reece
Keyword(s):  
Species Interactions ◽  
Disease Ecology ◽  
Social Evolution ◽  
Inclusive Fitness ◽  
Experimental Tests ◽  
Microbial Pathogens ◽  
Emergent Properties ◽  
Social Strategies ◽  
Inclusive Fitness Theory ◽  
Social Behaviours

One of the most striking facts about parasites and microbial pathogens that has emerged in the fields of social evolution and disease ecology in the past few decades is that these simple organisms have complex social lives, indulging in a variety of cooperative, communicative and coordinated behaviours. These organisms have provided elegant experimental tests of the importance of relatedness, kin discrimination, cooperation and competition, in driving the evolution of social strategies. Here, we briefly review the social behaviours of parasites and microbial pathogens, including their contributions to virulence, and outline how inclusive fitness theory has helped to explain their evolution. We then take a mechanistically inspired ‘bottom-up’ approach, discussing how key aspects of the ways in which parasites and pathogens exploit hosts, namely public goods, mobile elements, phenotypic plasticity, spatial structure and multi-species interactions, contribute to the emergent properties of virulence and transmission. We argue that unravelling the complexities of within-host ecology is interesting in its own right, and also needs to be better incorporated into theoretical evolution studies if social behaviours are to be understood and used to control the spread and severity of infectious diseases.

scholarly journals OPPOSITION TO INBREEDING AMONG CLOSE KIN

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jan Antfolk ◽  
Debra Lieberman ◽  
Christopher Harju ◽  
Anna Albrecht ◽  
Andreas Mokros ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Inclusive Fitness ◽  
Large Population ◽  
Self Regulation ◽  
Family Members ◽  
Indirect Costs ◽  
Population Based ◽  
Fitness Costs ◽  
Inclusive Fitness Theory ◽  
The Difference ◽  
Close Relatives

Due to the intense selection pressure against inbreeding, humans are expected to possess psychological adaptations that regulate mate choice and avoid inbreeding. From a gene’s-eye perspective, there is little difference in the evolutionary costs between situations where an individual him/herself is participating in inbreeding and inbreeding among other close relatives. The difference is merely quantitative, as fitness can be compromised via both routes. The question is whether humans are sensitive to the direct as well as indirect costs of inbreeding. Using responses from a large population-based sample (27,364 responses from 2,353 participants), we found that human motivations to avoid inbreeding closely track the theoretical costs of inbreeding as predicted by inclusive-fitness theory. Participants were asked to select in a forced choice paradigm, which of two acts of inbreeding with actual family members they would want to avoid most. We found that the estimated fitness costs explained 83.6% of participant choices. Importantly, fitness costs explained choices also when the self was not involved. We conclude that humans intuit the indirect fitness costs of mating decisions made by close family members and that psychological inbreeding avoidance mechanisms extend beyond self-regulation.

scholarly journals Modeling of the emulsion stability using fractal dimensions

2008 ◽  
Vol 14 (3) ◽  
pp. 153-158 ◽  
Author(s):  
Snezana Pasalic ◽  
Predrag Jovanic
Keyword(s):  
Emulsion Stability ◽  
Fractal Dimensions ◽  
Ccd Camera ◽  
Stability Evaluation ◽  
Stable States ◽  
Water Emulsion ◽  
Box Counting Method ◽  
The Stability ◽  
The Moment ◽  
Life Circle

There are many developed strategies in the emulsion stability evaluation, for purpose of determining the life circle of emulsions. Most of them are based on the reological properties of the emulsions. There are very few which relay on the direct emulsion observations. In this paper we present the developed method for the emulsion stability evaluation by the direct observation of optical properties. As the stability quantification measure we propose the fractal dimension approach. The method is based on the measure of the emulsion transmittance properties, which are directly dependent on the emulsion stability at the moment of measurement. As the test emulsion the oil in the water emulsion was used. The system is classified as the stable emulsion and our intention was to find the moment when the emulsion starts to break. The emulsion transmittance properties were measured using an acquisition system, consisting of a CCD camera and a fast PC configuration equipped with the capturing software. The fractal dimensions were determined by the so called box counting method. The experimental emulsions were measured continuously within the period of 1200 h, from the moment of the emulsion creation. The changes of fractal dimensions were observed which indicates that the emulsion changed its state and therefore the stability during the time. Three regions of the emulsion life circle were divided according to the fractal dimensions measurement, which can be connected with the stable, unstable, and meta-stable states of the emulsion life circle. In the end, the model of the emulsion behavior was developed for the purpose of quantifying the changes in the experimental emulsion.

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