Seminal fluid compromises visual perception in honeybee queens reducing their survival during additional mating flights
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Seminal fluid compromises visual perception in honeybee queens reducing their survival during additional mating flights. / Liberti, Joanito; Görner, Julia; Welch, Mat; Dosselli, Ryan; Schiøtt, Morten; Ogawa, Yuri; Castleden, Ian; Hemmi, Jan M.; Baer-Imhoof, Barbara; Boomsma, Jacobus J.; Baer, Boris.
In: eLife, Vol. 8, e45009, 2019.Research output: Contribution to journal › Journal article › Research › peer-review
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TY - JOUR
T1 - Seminal fluid compromises visual perception in honeybee queens reducing their survival during additional mating flights
AU - Liberti, Joanito
AU - Görner, Julia
AU - Welch, Mat
AU - Dosselli, Ryan
AU - Schiøtt, Morten
AU - Ogawa, Yuri
AU - Castleden, Ian
AU - Hemmi, Jan M.
AU - Baer-Imhoof, Barbara
AU - Boomsma, Jacobus J.
AU - Baer, Boris
PY - 2019
Y1 - 2019
N2 - Queens of social insects make all mate-choice decisions on a single day, except in honeybees whose queens can conduct mating flights for several days even when already inseminated by a number of drones. Honeybees therefore appear to have a unique, evolutionarily derived form of sexual conflict: a queen's decision to pursue risky additional mating flights is driven by later-life fitness gains from genetically more diverse worker-offspring but reduces paternity shares of the drones she already mated with. We used artificial insemination, RNA-sequencing and electroretinography to show that seminal fluid induces a decline in queen vision by perturbing the phototransduction pathway within 24-48 hr. Follow up field trials revealed that queens receiving seminal fluid flew two days earlier than sister queens inseminated with saline, and failed more often to return. These findings are consistent with seminal fluid components manipulating queen eyesight to reduce queen promiscuity across mating flights.
AB - Queens of social insects make all mate-choice decisions on a single day, except in honeybees whose queens can conduct mating flights for several days even when already inseminated by a number of drones. Honeybees therefore appear to have a unique, evolutionarily derived form of sexual conflict: a queen's decision to pursue risky additional mating flights is driven by later-life fitness gains from genetically more diverse worker-offspring but reduces paternity shares of the drones she already mated with. We used artificial insemination, RNA-sequencing and electroretinography to show that seminal fluid induces a decline in queen vision by perturbing the phototransduction pathway within 24-48 hr. Follow up field trials revealed that queens receiving seminal fluid flew two days earlier than sister queens inseminated with saline, and failed more often to return. These findings are consistent with seminal fluid components manipulating queen eyesight to reduce queen promiscuity across mating flights.
KW - Apis mellifera
KW - artificial insemination
KW - ecology
KW - evolutionary biology
KW - neurotranscriptomics
KW - RNA-sequencing
KW - sexual conflict
KW - social insects
U2 - 10.7554/eLife.45009
DO - 10.7554/eLife.45009
M3 - Journal article
C2 - 31500699
AN - SCOPUS:85071984153
VL - 8
JO - eLife
JF - eLife
SN - 2050-084X
M1 - e45009
ER -
ID: 227522179