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Queen signal should be honest to be involved in maintenance of eusociality: chemical correlates of fertility in Ropalidia marginata

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Abstract

Queens of many social insect species are known to maintain reproductive monopoly by pheromonal signalling of fecundity. Queens of the primitively eusocial wasp Ropalidia marginata appear to do so using secretions from their Dufour’s glands, whose hydrocarbon composition is correlated with fertility. Solitary nest foundresses of R. marginata are without nestmates; hence expressing a queen signal can be redundant, since there is no one to receive the signal. But if queen pheromone is an honest signal inextricably linked with fertility, it should correlate with fertility and be expressed irrespective of the presence or absence of receivers of the signal, by virtue of being a byproduct of the state of fertility. Hence we compared the Dufour’s gland hydrocarbons and ovaries of solitary foundresses with queens and workers of post-emergence nests. Our results suggest that queen pheromone composition in R. marginata is a byproduct of fertility and hence can honestly signal fertility. This provides important new evidence for the honest signalling hypothesis.

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Acknowledgments

We thank the Department of Science and Technology, the Department of Biotechnology, the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research and the Ministry of Environment and Forests, Government of India for financial assistance. AM carried out chemical analysis, ovarian dissections and statistical analysis. The paper was co-written by AM and RG, and RG supervised the overall work. All experiments reported here comply with the current laws of the country in which they were performed.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Centre for Ecological Sciences, Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore, 560012, India

    A. Mitra & R. Gadagkar

  2. Evolutionary and Organismal Biology Unit, Jawaharlal Nehru Centre for Advanced Scientific Research, Jakkur, Bangalore, India

    R. Gadagkar

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  1. A. Mitra
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  2. R. Gadagkar
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Correspondence to R. Gadagkar.

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Mitra, A., Gadagkar, R. Queen signal should be honest to be involved in maintenance of eusociality: chemical correlates of fertility in Ropalidia marginata . Insect. Soc. 59, 251–255 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00040-011-0214-6

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00040-011-0214-6

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