Evolution of increased early-life fecundity but faster reproductive senescence in Drosophila melanogaster females through adaptation to chronic live-yeast deprivation

Dietary restriction is a common ecological challenge that limits reproduction. Yet only a few studies have explored adaptation under chronic protein deprivation. We subjected four replicate laboratory-adapted populations (YLB) of Drosophila melanogaster to a complete deprivation of live-yeast to mimic diet restricted ecology. In this insect, live-yeast is a critical source of protein that strongly affect reproductive output, especially in females. Following 24 generations of experimental evolution, compared to their matched controls (BL), females from YLB populations showed increase in reproductive output early in life, both in presence and absence of live-yeast. The observed increase in reproductive output was not associated with any accommodating alteration in average egg size; and development time, pre-adult survivorship, and body mass at eclosion of the progeny. Interestingly, adult lifespan was also found to be unaffected. However, YLB females were found to have a significantly faster rate of reproductive senescence albeit without any change in a measure of lifetime reproductive output. Taken together, adaptation to LYD ecology shows that reproductive output can evolve without affecting lifespan, suggesting that widely observed reproduction-survival trade-off is not universal. Populations can optimize fitness by fine tuning the scheduling of reproduction even when lifetime reproductive output is constrained.

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The Effect of Different Light Regimes on Adult Lifespan in Drosophila melanogaster Is Partly Mediated through Reproductive Output

Journal of Biological Rhythms ◽

10.1177/074873000129001477 ◽

2000 ◽

Vol 15 (5) ◽

pp. 380-392 ◽

Cited By ~ 45

Author(s):

V. Sheeba ◽

Vijay K. Sharma ◽

K. Shubha ◽

M. K. Chandrashekaran ◽

Amitabh Joshi

Keyword(s):

Drosophila Melanogaster ◽

Reproductive Output ◽

Adult Lifespan ◽

Light Regimes

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The influence of temperature on egg size and variation in Drosophila melanogaster

Development Genes and Evolution ◽

10.1007/bf00579868 ◽

1934 ◽

Vol 132 (1) ◽

pp. 206-219 ◽

Cited By ~ 5

Author(s):

Takeo Imai

Keyword(s):

Drosophila Melanogaster ◽

Egg Size ◽

Influence Of Temperature ◽

Influence Of Temperature On

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A resource-poor developmental diet reduces adult aggression in male Drosophila melanogaster

Behavioral Ecology and Sociobiology ◽

10.1007/s00265-021-03050-z ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 75 (7) ◽

Author(s):

Danielle Edmunds ◽

Stuart Wigby ◽

Jennifer C. Perry

Keyword(s):

Drosophila Melanogaster ◽

Early Life ◽

Social Effects ◽

Energy Budgets ◽

Male Aggression ◽

Aggressive Interactions ◽

Low Resource ◽

Resource Poor ◽

Individual Effects ◽

Aggressive Behaviours

AbstractAggressive behaviours occur throughout the animal kingdom and agonistic contests often govern access to resources. Nutrition experienced during development has the potential to influence aggressive behaviours in adults through effects on growth, energy budgets and an individual’s internal state. In particular, resource-poor developmental nutrition might decrease adult aggression by limiting growth and energy budgets, or alternatively might increase adult aggression by enhancing motivation to compete for resources. However, the direction of this relationship—and effects of developmental nutrition experienced by rivals—remains unknown in most species, limiting understanding of how early-life environments contribute to variation in aggression. We investigated these alternative hypotheses by assessing male-male aggression in adult fruit flies, Drosophila melanogaster, that developed on a low-, medium- or high-resource diet, manipulated via yeast content. We found that a low-resource developmental diet reduced the probability of aggressive lunges in adults, as well as threat displays against rivals that developed on a low-resource diet. These effects appeared to be independent of diet-related differences in body mass. Males performed relatively more aggression on a central food patch when facing rivals of a low-resource diet, suggesting that developmental diet affects aggressive interactions through social effects in addition to individual effects. Our finding that resource-poor developmental diets reduce male-male aggression in D. melanogaster is consistent with the idea that resource budgets mediate aggression and in a mass-independent manner. Our study improves understanding of the links between nutrition and aggression.Significance statementEarly-life nutrition can influence social behaviours in adults. Aggression is a widespread social behaviour with important consequences for fitness. Using the fruit fly, Drosophila melanogaster, we show that a poor developmental diet reduces aspects of adult aggressive behaviour in males. Furthermore, males perform more aggression near food patches when facing rivals of poor nutrition. This suggests that early-life nutrition affects aggressive interactions through social effects in addition to individual effects.

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Life‐History Consequences of Divergent Selection on Egg Size in Drosophila melanogaster

The American Naturalist ◽

10.1086/303242 ◽

1999 ◽

Vol 154 (3) ◽

pp. 333-340 ◽

Cited By ~ 36

Author(s):

Lin Schwarzkopf ◽

Mark W. Blows ◽

M. Julian Caley

Keyword(s):

Drosophila Melanogaster ◽

Life History ◽

Egg Size ◽

Divergent Selection

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Intergenerational paternal effect of adult density in Drosophila melanogaster

10.1101/368613 ◽

2018 ◽

Author(s):

Purbasha Dasgupta ◽

Saubhik Sarkar ◽

Akankshya A. Das ◽

Tanya Verma ◽

Bodhisatta Nandy

Keyword(s):

Drosophila Melanogaster ◽

Treatment Effect ◽

Egg Size ◽

Competitive Ability ◽

Differential Mortality ◽

Adult Density ◽

Significant Treatment Effect ◽

Male Fitness ◽

Fitness Components ◽

Significant Treatment

AbstractNotwithstanding recent evidences, paternal environment is thought to be a potential but unlikely source of fitness variation that can affect trait evolution. Here we studied intergenerational effects of males’ exposure to varying adult density in Drosophila melanogaster laboratory populations.We held sires at normal (N), medium (M) and high (H) adult densities for two days before allowing them to mate with virgin females. This treatment did not introduce selection through differential mortality. Further, we randomly paired males and females and allowed a single round of mating between the sires and the dams. We then collected eggs from the dams and measured the egg size. Finally, we investigated the effect of the paternal treatment on juvenile and adult (male) fitness components.We found a significant treatment effect on juvenile competitive ability where the progeny sired by the H-males had higher competitive ability. Since we did not find the treatment to affect egg size, this effect is unlikely to be mediated through variation in female provisioning.Male fitness components were also found to have a significant treatment effect: M-sons had lower dry weight at eclosion, higher mating latency and lower competitive mating success.While being the first study to show both adaptive and non-adaptive effect of the paternal density in Drosophila, our results highlight the importance of considering paternal environment as important source of fitness variation.

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Combining metabolomics and experimental evolution reveals key mechanisms underlying longevity differences in laboratory evolved Drosophila melanogaster populations

10.1101/2021.10.16.464668 ◽

2021 ◽

Author(s):

Mark Phillips ◽

Kenneth R. Arnold ◽

Zer Vue ◽

Heather Beasley ◽

Edgar Garza Lopez ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Drosophila Melanogaster ◽

Carbohydrate Metabolism ◽

Experimental Evolution ◽

Statistical Power ◽

Accelerated Aging ◽

Experimental System ◽

Tca Cycle ◽

Dna And Rna ◽

Metabolomic Data ◽

Genetic Mechanisms

Experimental evolution with Drosophila melanogaster has been used extensively for decades to study aging and longevity. In recent years, the addition of DNA and RNA sequencing to this framework has allowed researchers to leverage the statistical power inherent to experimental evolution study the genetic basis of longevity itself. Here we incorporated metabolomic data into to this framework to generate even deeper insights into the physiological and genetic mechanisms underlying longevity differences in three groups of experimentally evolved D. melanogaster populations with different aging and longevity patterns. Our metabolomic analysis found that aging alters mitochondrial metabolism through increased consumption of NAD+ and increased usage of the TCA cycle. Combining our genomic and metabolomic data produced a list of biologically relevant candidate genes. Among these candidates, we found significant enrichment for genes and pathways associated with neurological development and function, and carbohydrate metabolism. While we do not explicitly find enrichment for aging canonical genes, neurological dysregulation and carbohydrate metabolism are both known to be associated with accelerated aging and reduced longevity. Taken together, our results in total provide very plausible genetic mechanisms for what might be driving longevity differences in this experimental system. More broadly, our findings demonstrate the value of combining multiple types of omic data with experimental evolution when attempting to dissect mechanisms underlying complex and highly polygenic traits like aging.

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