scholarly journals Defences against brood parasites from a social immunity perspective

2019 ◽  
Vol 374 (1769) ◽  
pp. 20180207 ◽  
Author(s):  
S. C. Cotter ◽  
D. Pincheira-Donoso ◽  
R. Thorogood
Keyword(s):  
Immune Responses ◽  
Brood Parasitism ◽  
Inclusive Fitness ◽  
Social Immunity ◽  
Theme Issue ◽  
Brood Parasites ◽  
Structured Groups ◽  
Parasitic Interactions ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Multicellular Organisms

Parasitic interactions are so ubiquitous that all multicellular organisms have evolved a system of defences to reduce their costs, whether the parasites they encounter are the classic parasites which feed on the individual, or brood parasites which usurp parental care. Many parallels have been drawn between defences deployed against both types of parasite, but typically, while defences against classic parasites have been selected to protect survival, those against brood parasites have been selected to protect the parent's inclusive fitness, suggesting that the selection pressures they impose are fundamentally different. However, there is another class of defences against classic parasites that have specifically been selected to protect an individual's inclusive fitness, known as social immunity . Social immune responses include the anti-parasite defences typically provided for others in kin-structured groups, such as the antifungal secretions produced by termite workers to protect the brood. Defences against brood parasites, therefore, are more closely aligned with social immune responses. Much like social immunity, host defences against brood parasitism are employed by a donor (a parent) for the benefit of one or more recipients (typically kin), and as with social defences against classic parasites, defences have therefore evolved to protect the donor's inclusive fitness, not the survival or ultimately the fitness of individual recipients This can lead to severe conflicts between the different parties, whose interests are not always aligned. Here, we consider defences against brood parasitism in the light of social immunity, at different stages of parasite encounter, addressing where conflicts occur and how they might be resolved. We finish with considering how this approach could help us to address longstanding questions in our understanding of brood parasitism. This article is part of the theme issue ‘The coevolutionary biology of brood parasitism: from mechanism to pattern’.

scholarly journals Patterns of host use by brood parasitic Maculinea butterflies across Europe

2019 ◽  
Vol 374 (1769) ◽  
pp. 20180202 ◽  
Author(s):  
András Tartally ◽  
Jeremy A. Thomas ◽  
Christian Anton ◽  
Emilio Balletto ◽  
Francesca Barbero ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Brood Parasitism ◽  
Geographical Variation ◽  
Host Switching ◽  
Host Use ◽  
Theme Issue ◽  
Geographic Mosaic ◽  
New Host ◽  
Brood Parasites ◽  
Comprehensive Survey ◽  
Maculinea Butterflies

The range of hosts exploited by a parasite is determined by several factors, including host availability, infectivity and exploitability. Each of these can be the target of natural selection on both host and parasite, which will determine the local outcome of interactions, and potentially lead to coevolution. However, geographical variation in host use and specificity has rarely been investigated. Maculinea (= Phengaris ) butterflies are brood parasites of Myrmica ants that are patchily distributed across the Palæarctic and have been studied extensively in Europe. Here, we review the published records of ant host use by the European Maculinea species, as well as providing new host ant records for more than 100 sites across Europe. This comprehensive survey demonstrates that while all but one of the Myrmica species found on Maculinea sites have been recorded as hosts, the most common is often disproportionately highly exploited. Host sharing and host switching are both relatively common, but there is evidence of specialization at many sites, which varies among Maculinea species. We show that most Maculinea display the features expected for coevolution to occur in a geographic mosaic, which has probably allowed these rare butterflies to persist in Europe. This article is part of the theme issue ‘The coevolutionary biology of brood parasitism: from mechanism to pattern’.

scholarly journals The coevolutionary biology of brood parasitism: a call for integration

2019 ◽  
Vol 374 (1769) ◽  
pp. 20180190 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rose Thorogood ◽  
Claire N. Spottiswoode ◽  
Steven J. Portugal ◽  
Ros Gloag
Keyword(s):  
Parental Care ◽  
Brood Parasitism ◽  
Evolutionary History ◽  
Social Evolution ◽  
Special Issue ◽  
Theme Issue ◽  
Brood Parasites ◽  
History Of ◽  
Ancient Times ◽  
Illuminating System

Obligate brood-parasitic cheats have fascinated natural historians since ancient times. Passing on the costs of parental care to others occurs widely in birds, insects and fish, and often exerts selection pressure on hosts that in turn evolve defences. Brood parasites have therefore provided an illuminating system for researching coevolution. Nevertheless, much remains unknown about how ecology and evolutionary history constrain or facilitate brood parasitism, or the mechanisms that shape or respond to selection. In this special issue, we bring together examples from across the animal kingdom to illustrate the diverse ways in which recent research is addressing these gaps. This special issue also considers how research on brood parasitism may benefit from, and in turn inform, related fields such as social evolution and immunity. Here, we argue that progress in our understanding of coevolution would benefit from the increased integration of ideas across taxonomic boundaries and across Tinbergen’s Four Questions: mechanism, ontogeny, function and phylogeny of brood parasitism. We also encourage renewed vigour in uncovering the natural history of the majority of the world's brood parasites that remain little-known. Indeed, it seems very likely that some of nature’s brood parasites remain entirely unknown, because otherwise we are left with a puzzle: if parental care is so costly, why is brood parasitism not more common?This article is part of the theme issue ‘The coevolutionary biology of brood parasitism: from mechanism to pattern’.

scholarly journals Parasitic cuckoo catfish exploit parental responses to stray offspring

2019 ◽  
Vol 374 (1769) ◽  
pp. 20180412 ◽  
Author(s):  
M. Polačik ◽  
M. Reichard ◽  
C. Smith ◽  
R. Blažek
Keyword(s):  
Brood Parasitism ◽  
Lake Tanganyika ◽  
Buccal Cavity ◽  
Brood Parasite ◽  
Theme Issue ◽  
Brood Parasites ◽  
Parental Response ◽  
Interspecific Brood Parasitism ◽  
Late Developmental Stage ◽  
Parental Responses

Interspecific brood parasitism occurs in several independent lineages of birds and social insects, putatively evolving from intraspecific brood parasitism. The cuckoo catfish, Synodontis multipunctatus , the only known obligatory non-avian brood parasite, exploits mouthbrooding cichlid fishes in Lake Tanganyika, despite the absence of parental care in its evolutionary lineage (family Mochokidae). Cuckoo catfish participate in host spawning events, with their eggs subsequently collected and brooded by parental cichlids, though they can later be selectively rejected by the host. One scenario for the origin of brood parasitism in cuckoo catfish is through predation of cichlid eggs during spawning, eventually resulting in a spatial and temporal match in oviposition by host and parasite. Here we demonstrate experimentally that, uniquely among all known brood parasites, cuckoo catfish have the capacity to re-infect their hosts at a late developmental stage following egg rejection. We show that cuckoo catfish offspring can survive outside the host buccal cavity and re-infect parental hosts at a later incubation phase by exploiting the strong parental instinct of hosts to collect stray offspring. This finding implies an alternative evolutionary origin for cuckoo catfish brood parasitism, with the parental response of host cichlids facilitating its evolution. This article is part of the theme issue ‘The coevolutionary biology of brood parasitism: from mechanism to pattern’.

scholarly journals Under the radar: detection avoidance in brood parasitic bees

2019 ◽  
Vol 374 (1769) ◽  
pp. 20180196 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jessica R. Litman
Keyword(s):  
Brood Parasitism ◽  
Solitary Bees ◽  
General Context ◽  
Brood Parasite ◽  
Theme Issue ◽  
Evolutionary Transitions ◽  
Brood Parasites ◽  
Selective Pressures ◽  
Specialized Form ◽  
Fierce Competition

Brood parasitism is a specialized form of parasitism in which the offspring of a parasite develops on the food provisions gathered by a host species for its own young. Obligate brood parasitic lineages have lost the ability to acquire provisions for their young and thus rely entirely on the location of an appropriate host to serve as a food-provider. Solitary bees provide some of the most fascinating examples of brood parasitism in animals. Most solitary bees build and provision their own nests. Some, however, usurp the nests of other species of bees. These brood parasites, or ‘cuckoo’ bees, deposit their eggs on the pollen provisions collected by a host bee for her own offspring. The provisions stored by the host bee are not sufficient to sustain the development of both the host's larva and that of the brood parasite and the parasite must kill the offspring of its host in order to obtain enough nourishment to complete its development. As a consequence, there is fierce competition between the host bee seeking to protect her nest from attack and the brood parasite seeking to avoid detection by the host in order to successfully deposit her eggs in an appropriate nest. In this paper, I review the behaviours that allow brood parasitic bees to escape detection by their hosts. Identifying these behaviours, and placing them within the general context of strategies employed by brood parasitic bees to parasitize the nests of their hosts, is key to understanding how brood parasitic lineages may have evolved from nest-building ancestors, decrypting the selective pressures that drive evolutionary transitions from one strategy to another and, more broadly, revealing how similar selective pressures in widely divergent lineages of animals have given rise to remarkably convergent behaviours. This article is part of the theme issue ‘The coevolutionary biology of brood parasitism: from mechanism to pattern’.

No support for relatedness and kin selection to explain high rates of conspecific brood parasitism in colonial Red-breasted Mergansers

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kristen Noel ◽  
Rodger Titman ◽  
Shawn R. Craik
Keyword(s):  
Kin Selection ◽  
Brood Parasitism ◽  
Inclusive Fitness ◽  
Demographic Data ◽  
Egg Laying ◽  
Conspecific Brood Parasitism ◽  
Brood Parasites ◽  
Fitness Benefits ◽  
Small Decline ◽  
Diurnal Period

Conspecific brood parasitism (CBP) has been observed in approximately half of all species of waterfowl, a philopatric group in which breeding females are frequently locally related. It has been suggested that kin selection can facilitate the evolution of CBP in waterfowl via fitness benefits for the host and parasite. One model demonstrates that discrimination of related and unrelated parasites by the host must be sufficient for kinship to promote CBP, provided that costs of brood parasitism to host fitness are sufficiently low. We parameterized the model using demographic data and behavioural observations from a population of colonial Red-breasted Mergansers (Mergus serrator (Linnaeus, 1758)) in which 47% of nests were parasitized by conspecifics. The costs of 1-3 foreign eggs to host hatching success were generally small (decline of 1.8% per additional egg). Nevertheless, model outputs revealed that brood parasites maximize their inclusive fitness by avoiding nests of relatives, primarily because of constraints on a host’s ability to detect parasites at the nest. Indeed, hosts spent <8% of the diurnal period at the nest during egg laying, a period when parasite activity is greatest. It is thus highly unlikely that relatedness and kin selection promote brood parasitism in this population.

scholarly journals The brood parasite's guide to inclusive fitness theory

2019 ◽  
Vol 374 (1769) ◽  
pp. 20180198 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ros Gloag ◽  
Madeleine Beekman
Keyword(s):  
Brood Parasitism ◽  
Social Behaviour ◽  
Inclusive Fitness ◽  
Alloparental Care ◽  
Brood Parasite ◽  
Brood Parasites ◽  
Inclusive Fitness Theory ◽  
Kin Structure ◽  
Host Evolution ◽  
Reproductive Tactic

Hamilton's theory of inclusive fitness provides a framework for understanding the evolution of social behaviour between kin, including parental and alloparental care. Brood parasitism is a reproductive tactic in which parasites exploit the care of other individuals of the same species (conspecific parasitism) or different species (interspecific parasitism) to rear their brood. Here, drawing from examples in birds and social insects, we identify two insights into brood parasitism that stem from inclusive fitness theory. First, the kin structure within nests, or between neighbouring nests, can create a niche space favouring the evolution of conspecific parasitism. For example, low average relatedness within social insect nests can increase selection for reproductive cheats. Likewise, high average relatedness between adjacent nests of some birds can increase a female's tolerance of parasitism by her neighbour. Second, intrabrood conflict will be high in parasitized broods, from the perspective of both parasite and host young, relative to unparasitized broods. We also discuss offspring recognition by hosts as an example of discrimination in a kin-selected social behaviour. We conclude that the inclusive fitness framework is instructive for understanding aspects of brood parasite and host evolution. In turn, brood parasites present some unique opportunities to test the predictions of inclusive fitness theory.This article is part of the theme issue ‘The coevolutionary biology of brood parasitism: from mechanism to pattern’.

scholarly journals Egg retrieval versus egg rejection in cuckoo hosts

2019 ◽  
Vol 374 (1769) ◽  
pp. 20180200 ◽  
Author(s):  
Canchao Yang ◽  
Wei Liang ◽  
Anders P. Møller
Keyword(s):  
Brood Parasitism ◽  
Visual Cues ◽  
Egg Rejection ◽  
Egg Recognition ◽  
Theme Issue ◽  
Brood Parasites ◽  
Cavity Nesting ◽  
Series Of Experiments ◽  
Avian Brood Parasitism ◽  
Different Levels

Before complex nests evolved, birds laid eggs on the ground, and egg retrieval evolved as an adaptation against accidental displacement of eggs outside the nest. Therefore, egg retrieval is an ancient, and likely ancestral, widespread behaviour in birds. However, it has received little attention in studies of avian brood parasitism, perhaps because most parasitism occurs in species with complex nests, a context in which egg retrieval seems irrelevant. However, for cavity-nesting hosts of avian brood parasites, egg retrieval may still play an important role in the coevolutionary interactions between obligate brood parasites and hosts, because egg retrieval can be considered to be antagonistic to egg rejection behaviour in hosts, yet both may involve cognition to recognize eggs. We hypothesized that (1) cavity-nesting hosts should retrieve misplaced eggs from outside the nest cup, (2) brood parasitism has modulated egg retrieval behaviour in cavity-nesting hosts and (3) hosts use the same visual cues for decision-making during egg recognition in both egg retrieval and egg rejection actions. To test these hypotheses, we performed a series of experiments in a cavity-nesting host, the green-backed tit (Parus monticolus). Foreign eggs with different levels of mimicry were placed within or outside nest cups of hosts to test their responses. We found that host decisions about whether to retrieve or reject an egg both depended on the degree of mimicry. However, hosts sometimes first retrieved poorly mimetic foreign eggs and then rejected them. Alternatively, hosts sometimes failed to retrieve highly mimetic conspecific eggs. We suggest that egg retrieval in hosts is likely to be a result of the interaction between ancient retrieval behaviour and subsequent adaptation against brood parasitism.This article is part of the theme issue ‘The coevolutionary biology of brood parasitism: from mechanism to pattern’.

Role of Transcriptional Read-Through in PRE Activity in Drosophila melanogaster

Acta Naturae ◽  
2016 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 79-86 ◽  
Author(s):  
P. V. Elizar’ev ◽  
D. V. Lomaev ◽  
D. A. Chetverina ◽  
P. G. Georgiev ◽  
M. M. Erokhin
Keyword(s):  
Dna Sequences ◽  
Cell Types ◽  
Transcription Terminator ◽  
Response Elements ◽  
Polycomb Response Elements ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Multicellular Organisms ◽  
Different Cell Types ◽  
Main Factor

Maintenance of the individual patterns of gene expression in different cell types is required for the differentiation and development of multicellular organisms. Expression of many genes is controlled by Polycomb (PcG) and Trithorax (TrxG) group proteins that act through association with chromatin. PcG/TrxG are assembled on the DNA sequences termed PREs (Polycomb Response Elements), the activity of which can be modulated and switched from repression to activation. In this study, we analyzed the influence of transcriptional read-through on PRE activity switch mediated by the yeast activator GAL4. We show that a transcription terminator inserted between the promoter and PRE doesnt prevent switching of PRE activity from repression to activation. We demonstrate that, independently of PRE orientation, high levels of transcription fail to dislodge PcG/TrxG proteins from PRE in the absence of a terminator. Thus, transcription is not the main factor required for PRE activity switch.

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 Every Detail Matters. That Is, How the Interaction between Gα Proteins and Membrane Affects Their Function

Membranes ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (3) ◽  
pp. 222
Author(s):  
Agnieszka Polit ◽  
Paweł Mystek ◽  
Ewa Błasiak
Keyword(s):  
Signal Transduction ◽  
G Protein ◽  
G Proteins ◽  
Lipid Membranes ◽  
Signaling Proteins ◽  
Heterotrimeric G Proteins ◽  
Membrane Attachment ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Multicellular Organisms ◽  
G Protein Coupled

In highly organized multicellular organisms such as humans, the functions of an individual cell are dependent on signal transduction through G protein-coupled receptors (GPCRs) and subsequently heterotrimeric G proteins. As most of the elements belonging to the signal transduction system are bound to lipid membranes, researchers are showing increasing interest in studying the accompanying protein–lipid interactions, which have been demonstrated to not only provide the environment but also regulate proper and efficient signal transduction. The mode of interaction between the cell membrane and G proteins is well known. Despite this, the recognition mechanisms at the molecular level and how the individual G protein-membrane attachment signals are interrelated in the process of the complex control of membrane targeting of G proteins remain unelucidated. This review focuses on the mechanisms by which mammalian Gα subunits of G proteins interact with lipids and the factors responsible for the specificity of membrane association. We summarize recent data on how these signaling proteins are precisely targeted to a specific site in the membrane region by introducing well-defined modifications as well as through the presence of polybasic regions within these proteins and interactions with other components of the heterocomplex.

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