The dynamics of sexual conflict over mating rate with endosymbiont infection that affects reproductive phenotypes

2007 ◽  
Vol 20 (6) ◽  
pp. 2154-2164 ◽  
Author(s):  
T. I. HAYASHI ◽  
J. L. MARSHALL ◽  
S. GAVRILETS
Keyword(s):  
Sexual Conflict ◽  
Mating Rate

Sexual conflict inGerris gillettei(Insecta: Hemiptera): influence of effective mating rate and morphology on reproductive success

2012 ◽  
Vol 90 (11) ◽  
pp. 1297-1306 ◽  
Author(s):  
Marie-Claude Gagnon ◽  
Pierre Duchesne ◽  
Julie Turgeon
Keyword(s):  
Sexual Selection ◽  
Reproductive Success ◽  
Sexual Conflict ◽  
Water Strider ◽  
Mating Rate ◽  
Multiple Matings ◽  
Males And Females ◽  
Genetic Mating System ◽  
Selection Framework ◽  
Resistance Traits

In water striders, the interests of both sexes diverge over the decision to mate, leading to precopulatory sexual conflict. The influence of mating rate and key persistence and resistance traits on reproductive success has seldom been investigated in the context of multiple matings. We used amplified fragment length polymorphism (AFLP) based genetic parentage analyses to estimate mating and reproductive success in Gerris gillettei Lethierry and Severin, 1896, while allowing for free multiple matings. We tested the hypotheses that males should display stronger opportunity for sexual selection and steeper Bateman gradients. In each sex, persistence and resistance traits should also impact mating and reproductive success. Surprisingly, males and females had similarly high and variable effective mating rates (i.e., number of genetic partners), and both sexes produce more offspring when mating with more partners. As predicted, exaggerated persistence traits allowed males to mate with more partners and sire more offspring. However, we found no evidence for an impact of resistance traits for females. The mating environment may have favoured low resistance in females, but high promiscuity can be beneficial for females. This first description of the genetic mating system for a water strider species suggests that the determinants of fitness can be further deciphered using the sexual selection framework.

scholarly journals Do female Nicrophorus vespilloides reduce direct costs by choosing males that mate less frequently?

2016 ◽  
Vol 12 (3) ◽  
pp. 20151064 ◽  
Author(s):  
P. E. Hopwood ◽  
G. P. F. Mazué ◽  
M. J. Carter ◽  
M. L. Head ◽  
A. J. Moore ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Sexual Conflict ◽  
Negative Relationship ◽  
Direct Costs ◽  
The Other ◽  
Female Size ◽  
Dichotomous Choice ◽  
Burying Beetle ◽  
Mating Rate ◽  
Repeated Mating ◽  
Nicrophorus Vespilloides

Sexual conflict occurs when selection to maximize fitness in one sex does so at the expense of the other sex. In the burying beetle Nicrophorus vespilloides , repeated mating provides assurance of paternity at a direct cost to female reproductive productivity. To reduce this cost, females could choose males with low repeated mating rates or smaller, servile males. We tested this by offering females a dichotomous choice between males from lines selected for high or low mating rate. Each female was then allocated her preferred or non-preferred male to breed. Females showed no preference for males based on whether they came from lines selected for high or low mating rates. Pairs containing males from high mating rate lines copulated more often than those with low line males but there was a negative relationship between female size and number of times she mated with a non-preferred male. When females bred with their preferred male the number of offspring reared increased with female size but there was no such increase when breeding with non-preferred males. Females thus benefited from being choosy, but this was not directly attributable to avoidance of costly male repeated mating.

Food limitation causes female haglids to mate more often

2011 ◽  
Vol 89 (10) ◽  
pp. 992-998 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kevin A. Judge ◽  
Paul A. De Luca ◽  
Glenn K. Morris
Keyword(s):  
Beneficial Effect ◽  
Sexual Conflict ◽  
Breeding System ◽  
Mating Success ◽  
Hind Wing ◽  
Food Limitation ◽  
Mating Rate ◽  
Material Benefits ◽  
Wing Damage ◽  
Evolution Of Polyandry

Sexual conflict over mating rate has selected for male adaptations to induce females to mate. These inducements can be either coercive or enticing, and there is a growing realization that males of a given species may employ both tactics simultaneously to acquire mating success. Insects in the genus Cyphoderris Uhler, 1864 (Orthoptera: Haglidae) have a unique breeding system in which females feed on the fleshy hind wings of males during copulation, but as mating proceeds males use a specialized abdominal pinching organ known as a gin trap to hold the female until she copulates with him. Previous research has demonstrated the coercive nature of the gin trap, but evidence for a beneficial effect of hind-wing feeding is lacking. Here we tested whether hind-wing feeding provides material benefits to females by manipulating females’ access to nutrition—food restricted or ad lib food—and then providing females with four opportunities to mate over 8 days. As predicted, food-restricted females were more likely to feed on male hind wings, did more hind-wing damage, and were more likely to copulate with males than females provided ad lib food. We discuss these results in the context of the evolution of polyandry and sexual conflict.

scholarly journals Sexual conflict over mating and fertilization: an overview

2006 ◽  
Vol 361 (1466) ◽  
pp. 235-259 ◽  
Author(s):  
G.A Parker
Keyword(s):  
Sexual Conflict ◽  
Current Evidence ◽  
Indirect Benefit ◽  
Female Resistance ◽  
Mate Quality ◽  
Direct Benefit ◽  
Mating Rate ◽  
Optimal Outcomes ◽  
Behavioural Conflict ◽  
Males And Females

Sexual conflict is a conflict between the evolutionary interests of individuals of the two sexes. The sexes can have different trait optima but this need not imply conflict if their optima can be attained simultaneously. Conflict requires an interaction between males and females (e.g. mating or parental care), such that the optimal outcomes for each sex cannot be achieved simultaneously. It is important to distinguish between battleground models, which define the parameter space for conflict and resolution models, which seek solutions for how conflicts are resolved. Overt behavioural conflict may or may not be manifest at resolution. Following Fisherian principles, an immediate (i.e. direct) benefit to a male that has a direct cost to his female partner can have an indirect benefit to the female via her male progeny. Female resistance to mating has been claimed to represent concurrence rather than conflict, due to female benefits via sons (males with low mating advantage are screened out by resistance). However, the weight of current evidence (both theoretical and empirical) supports sexual conflict for many cases. I review (i) conflicts over mate quality, encounters between males and females of genetically diverged subpopulations, mating rate and inbreeding, (ii) the special features of postcopulatory sexual conflict and (iii) some general features of importance for conflict resolution.

scholarly journals The evolution of optimal female mating rate changes the coevolutionary dynamics of female resistance and male persistence

2012 ◽  
Vol 367 (1600) ◽  
pp. 2339-2347 ◽  
Author(s):  
Erem Kazancıoğlu ◽  
Suzanne H. Alonzo
Keyword(s):  
Sexual Conflict ◽  
Mating Success ◽  
Male Mating ◽  
Theoretical Studies ◽  
Male Mating Success ◽  
Female Resistance ◽  
Previous Theory ◽  
Mating Rate ◽  
Mating Patterns ◽  
Female Mating

Mating decisions usually involve conflict of interests between sexes. Accordingly, males benefit from increased number of matings, whereas costs of mating favour a lower mating rate for females. The resulting sexual conflict underlies the coevolution of male traits that affect male mating success (‘persistence’) and female traits that affect female mating patterns (‘resistance’). Theoretical studies on the coevolutionary dynamics of male persistence and female resistance assumed that costs of mating and, consequently, the optimal female mating rate are evolutionarily constant. Costs of mating, however, are often caused by male ‘persistence’ traits that determine mating success. Here, we present a model where the magnitude of costs of mating depend on, and evolve with, male persistence. We find that allowing costs of mating to depend on male persistence results in qualitatively different coevolutionary dynamics. Specifically, we find that male traits such as penis spikes that harm females are not predicted to exhibit runaway selection with female resistance, in contrast to previous theory that predicts indefinite escalation. We argue that it is essential to determine when and to what extent costs of mating are caused by male persistence in order to understand and accurately predict coevolutionary dynamics of traits involved in mating decisions.

scholarly journals A role for sexual conflict in the evolution of reproductive traits in Nasonia wasps?

2009 ◽  
Vol 59 (4) ◽  
pp. 417-434 ◽  
Author(s):  
Leo Beukeboom ◽  
Bart Pannebakker ◽  
Sylvia Gerritsma ◽  
Elzemiek Geuverink
Keyword(s):  
Sexual Conflict ◽  
Sex Allocation ◽  
Species Differences ◽  
Reproductive Traits ◽  
Reproductive Behaviour ◽  
Conflict Theory ◽  
Mating Frequency ◽  
Mating Rate ◽  
Heterospecific Male ◽  
Female Lifespan

AbstractSexual conflict theory predicts that female and male reproductive traits coevolve resulting in disruption of reproductive behaviour upon mating of individuals from diverged populations. We used interfertile species of haplodiploid Nasonia wasps to compare re-mating frequency, longevity, oviposition rate and sperm use of conspecifically and heterospecifically mated females. Females that first mated with a heterospecific male re-mated more often a second time, indicating that conspecific males reduce female receptivity more. Mating did not affect female lifespan. Lifetime production of sons and daughters was significantly reduced in heterospecifically mated females. Dissection of females confirmed that heterospecific sperm survives equally well as conspecific sperm during storage in the spermatheca. Differences in daily fecundity and age at which females become sperm depleted could in part be explained by species differences in ovariole numbers. We conclude that sexual conflict may play a role in the evolution of female mating rate, fecundity and sex allocation in Nasonia.

scholarly journals Sexual conflict and STIs: coevolution of sexually antagonistic host traits with a sexually transmitted infection

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alison M. Wardlaw ◽  
Aneil F. Agrawal
Keyword(s):  
Sexual Conflict ◽  
Sexually Transmitted Infection ◽  
Female Mate Choice ◽  
Relative Strength ◽  
Female Resistance ◽  
Transmitted Infection ◽  
Mating Rate ◽  
Sexually Transmitted ◽  
Establishment Probability ◽  
Sexually Antagonistic Coevolution

AbstractIn many taxa, there is a conflict between the sexes over mating rate. The outcome of sexually antagonistic coevolution depends on the costs of mating and natural selection against sexually antagonistic traits. A sexually transmitted infection (STI) changes the relative strength of these costs. We study the three-way evolutionary interaction between male persistence, female resistance, and STI virulence for two types of STIs: a viability-reducing STI and a reproduction-reducing STI. A viability-reducing STI escalates conflict between the sexes. This leads to increased STI virulence (i.e., full coevolution) if the costs of sexually antagonistic traits occur through viability but not if the costs occur through reproduction. In contrast, a reproduction-reducing STI de-escalates the sexual conflict but STI virulence does not coevolve in response. We also investigated the establishment probability of STIs under different combinations of evolvability. Successful invasion by a viability-reducing STI becomes less likely if hosts (but not parasite) are evolvable, especially if only the female trait can evolve. A reproduction-reducing STI can almost always invade because it does not kill its host. We discuss how the evolution of host and parasite traits in a system with sexual conflict differ from a system with female mate choice.

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