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Frontiers in Insect Science 2023
PubMed: 38469501
DOI: 10.3389/finsc.2023.1186027 -
Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution 2019Animals have evolved different foraging strategies in which some animals forage independently and others forage in groups. The evolution of social feeding does not...
Animals have evolved different foraging strategies in which some animals forage independently and others forage in groups. The evolution of social feeding does not necessarily require cooperation; social feeding can be a beneficial individual-level strategy if it provides mutualistic benefits, for example though increasing the efficiency of resource extraction or processing. We found that , the simplest multicellular animal ever described, engages in social feeding behavior. lacks muscle tissue, nervous and digestive systems - yet is capable of aggregating and forming groups of closely connected individuals who collectively feed. The tight physical interactions between the animals are transitory and appear to serve the goal of staying connected to neighbors during the external digestion of algae when enzymes are released on the biofilm and nutrients are absorbed through the ventral epithelium. We found that are more likely to engage in social feeding when the concentrations of algae are high - both in a semi-natural conditions and . It is surprising that - an organism without a nervous system - is able to engage in this social feeding behavior. Whether this behavior is cooperative is still an open question. Nevertheless, the social feeding behavior of , an early multicellular animal, suggests that sociality may have played an important role in the early evolution of animals. It also suggests that could be used as a simple model organism for exploring questions regarding ecology and sociobiology.
PubMed: 31667165
DOI: 10.3389/fevo.2019.00019 -
F1000Research 2016Kin selection and multilevel selection are two major frameworks in evolutionary biology that aim at explaining the evolution of social behaviors. However, the... (Review)
Review
Kin selection and multilevel selection are two major frameworks in evolutionary biology that aim at explaining the evolution of social behaviors. However, the relationship between these two theories has been plagued by controversy for almost half a century and debates about their relevance and usefulness in explaining social evolution seem to rekindle at regular intervals. Here, we first provide a concise introduction into the kin selection and multilevel selection theories and shed light onto the roots of the controversy surrounding them. We then review two major aspects of the current debate: the presumed formal equivalency of the two theories and the question whether group selection can lead to group adaptation. We conclude by arguing that the two theories can offer complementary approaches to the study of social evolution: kin selection approaches usually focus on the identification of optimal phenotypes and thus on the endresult of a selection process, whereas multilevel selection approaches focus on the ongoing selection process itself. The two theories thus provide different perspectives that might be fruitfully combined to promote our understanding of the evolution in group-structured populations.
PubMed: 27158472
DOI: 10.12688/f1000research.8018.1 -
Journal of Comparative Physiology. A,... Jul 2023The neural basis underlying spatial orientation in arthropods, in particular insects, has received considerable interest in recent years. This special issue of the...
The neural basis underlying spatial orientation in arthropods, in particular insects, has received considerable interest in recent years. This special issue of the Journal of Comparative Physiology A seeks to take account of these developments by presenting a collection of eight review articles and eight original research articles highlighting hotspots of research on spatial orientation in arthropods ranging from flies to spiders and the underlying neural circuits. The contributions impressively illustrate the wide range of tools available to arthropods extending from specific sensory channels to highly sophisticated neural computations for mastering complex navigational challenges.
Topics: Animals; Arthropods; Orientation, Spatial; Space Perception; Insecta; Spiders
PubMed: 37198448
DOI: 10.1007/s00359-023-01635-9 -
Frontiers in Genetics 2015Many recent breakthroughs in our understanding of termite biology have been facilitated by "omics" research. Omic science seeks to collectively catalog, quantify, and... (Review)
Review
Many recent breakthroughs in our understanding of termite biology have been facilitated by "omics" research. Omic science seeks to collectively catalog, quantify, and characterize pools of biological molecules that translate into structure, function, and life processes of an organism. Biological molecules in this context include genomic DNA, messenger RNA, proteins, and other biochemicals. Other permutations of omics that apply to termites include sociogenomics, which seeks to define social life in molecular terms (e.g., behavior, sociality, physiology, symbiosis, etc.) and digestomics, which seeks to define the collective pool of host and symbiont genes that collaborate to achieve high-efficiency lignocellulose digestion in the termite gut. This review covers a wide spectrum of termite omic studies from the past 15 years. Topics covered include a summary of terminology, the various kinds of omic efforts that have been undertaken, what has been revealed, and to a degree, what the results mean. Although recent omic efforts have contributed to a better understanding of many facets of termite and symbiont biology, and have created important new resources for many species, significant knowledge gaps still remain. Crossing these gaps can best be done by applying new omic resources within multi-dimensional (i.e., functional, translational, and applied) research programs.
PubMed: 25821456
DOI: 10.3389/fgene.2015.00076 -
Philosophical Transactions of the Royal... May 2015This theme issue has highlighted the links between sociality, health and fitness in a broad range of organisms, and with approaches that include field and captive... (Review)
Review
This theme issue has highlighted the links between sociality, health and fitness in a broad range of organisms, and with approaches that include field and captive studies of animals, comparative and meta-analyses, theoretical modelling and clinical and psychological studies of humans. In this concluding chapter, we synthesize the results of these diverse studies into some of the key concepts discussed in this issue, focusing on risks of infectious disease through social contact, the effects of competition in groups on susceptibility to disease, and the integration of sociality into research on life-history trade-offs. Interestingly, the studies in this issue both support pre-existing hypotheses, and in other ways challenge those hypotheses. We focus on unexpected results, including a lack of association between ectoparasites and fitness and weak results from a meta-analysis of the links between dominance rank and immune function, and place these results in a broader context. We also review relevant topics that were not covered fully in this theme issue, including self-medication and sickness behaviours, society-level defences against infectious disease, sexual selection, evolutionary medicine, implications for conservation biology and selective pressures on parasite traits. We conclude by identifying general open questions to stimulate and guide future research on the links between sociality, health and fitness.
Topics: Animals; Biological Evolution; Communicable Diseases; Disease Susceptibility; Female; Genetic Fitness; Health Status; Host-Parasite Interactions; Humans; Male; Models, Biological; Sex Preselection; Sexually Transmitted Diseases; Social Behavior
PubMed: 25870401
DOI: 10.1098/rstb.2014.0115 -
Nature Human Behaviour Nov 2018Arabs represent a major cultural group, yet one that is relatively neglected in cultural psychology. We hypothesized that Arab culture is characterized by a unique form...
Arabs represent a major cultural group, yet one that is relatively neglected in cultural psychology. We hypothesized that Arab culture is characterized by a unique form of interdependence that is self-assertive. Arab cultural identity emerged historically in regions with harsh ecological and climatic environments, in which it was necessary to protect the survival of tribal groups. Individuals in Arabian cultures were honour-bound to be respectable and trustworthy group members. Supporting this hypothesis, study 1 found that Arabs were interdependent and holistic (like East Asians), but also self-assertive (like Westerners). This psychological profile was observed equally for both Muslim and Christian Arabs, thus ruling out Islamic religion as an alternative explanation for our findings. Studies 2 and 3 showed that the self-assertive tendency of Arabs is in service of interdependence, whereas that of Westerners is in service of independence. Our work contributes to the current effort by cultural psychologists to go beyond the prevailing East versus West, interdependence versus independence paradigm. It also speaks to the emerging socioecological perspective in cultural research.
Topics: Arabs; Assertiveness; Christianity; Cross-Cultural Comparison; Culture; Environment; Humans; Islam; Sociobiology
PubMed: 31558808
DOI: 10.1038/s41562-018-0435-z -
F1000Research 2020Passive acoustic monitoring of soundscapes and biodiversity produces vast amounts of audio recordings, but the management and analyses of these raw data present...
Passive acoustic monitoring of soundscapes and biodiversity produces vast amounts of audio recordings, but the management and analyses of these raw data present technical challenges. A multitude of software solutions exist, but none can fulfil all purposes required for the management, processing, navigation, analysis, and dissemination of acoustic data. The field of ecoacoustics needs a software tool that is free, evolving, and accessible. We take a step in that direction and present ecoSound-web: an open-source, online platform for ecoacoustics designed and built by ecologists and software engineers. ecoSound-web can be used for storing, organising, and sharing soundscape projects, manually creating and peer-reviewing annotations of soniferous animals and phonies, analysing audio in time and frequency, computing alpha acoustic indices, and providing reference sound libraries for different taxa. We present ecoSound-web's features, structure, and compare it with similar software. We describe its operation mode and the workflow for typical use cases such as the sampling of bird and bat communities, the use of a primate call library, and the analysis of phonies and acoustic indices. ecoSound-web is available from: https://github.com/ecomontec/ecoSound-web.
PubMed: 33274051
DOI: 10.12688/f1000research.26369.2 -
Current Opinion in Insect Science Feb 2023The central complex in the brain of insects is a group of midline-spanning neuropils at the interface between sensory and premotor tasks of the brain. It is involved in... (Review)
Review
The central complex in the brain of insects is a group of midline-spanning neuropils at the interface between sensory and premotor tasks of the brain. It is involved in sleep control, decision-making and most prominently in goal-directed locomotion behaviors. The recently published connectome of the central complex of Drosophila melanogaster is a milestone in understanding the intricacies of the central-complex circuits and will provide inspiration for testable hypotheses for the coming years. Here, I provide a basic neuroanatomical description of the central complex of Drosophila and other species and discuss some recent advancements, some of which, such as the discovery of coordinate transformation through vector math, have been predicted from connectomics data.
Topics: Animals; Drosophila melanogaster; Neurons; Drosophila; Brain; Insecta
PubMed: 36126877
DOI: 10.1016/j.cois.2022.100972 -
Journal of Insect Science (Online) May 2024Honey bees are the most important managed insect pollinators in the US and Canadian crop systems. However, the annual mortality of colonies in the past 15 years has been...
Honey bees are the most important managed insect pollinators in the US and Canadian crop systems. However, the annual mortality of colonies in the past 15 years has been consistently higher than historical records. Because they are eusocial generalist pollinators and amenable to management, honey bees provide a unique opportunity to investigate a wide range of questions at molecular, organismal, and ecological scales. Here, the American Association of Professional Apiculturists (AAPA) and the Canadian Association of Professional Apiculturists (CAPA) created 2 collections of articles featuring investigations on micro and macro aspects of honey bee health, sociobiology, and management showcasing new applied research from diverse groups studying honey bees (Apis mellifera) in the United States and Canada. Research presented in this special issue includes examinations of abiotic and biotic stressors of honey bees, and evaluations and introductions of various stress mitigation measures that may be valuable to both scientists and the beekeeping community. These investigations from throughout the United States and Canada showcase the wide breadth of current work done and point out areas that need further research.
Topics: Bees; Animals; Canada; United States; Beekeeping; Stress, Physiological; Pollination
PubMed: 38805646
DOI: 10.1093/jisesa/ieae055