TY - JOUR

T1 - Dietary diversity, sociality, and the evolution of ant gustation

AU - Smith, E. Jordan

AU - Vizueta, Joel

AU - Younger, Meg A. A.

AU - Mullen, Sean P. P.

AU - Traniello, James F. A.

PY - 2023

Y1 - 2023

N2 - Ants have remarkably diverse diets and extraordinary species richness, making them an excellent model system to study the evolution of taste. In this entirely eusocial clade, food choice and the mechanisms that regulate feeding have both individual and social dimensions. How taste receptors and sensory processing drive food preferences to generate dietary breadth in ants is poorly understood. It is additionally unclear how elements of colony organization such as division of labor and social food flow impact the mechanistic basis and evolution of taste. Previous work on dipteran, lepidopteran, and hymenopteran gustatory systems, while foundational, provide limited insights into ant dietary specialization. Here we synthesize and analyze research on ant gustation to identify mechanisms, sociobiological correlates, and phylogenetic patterns. We discuss the current state of genomic analyses of taste and future research. We propose that strikingly polymorphic species of Pheidole, Cephalotes, Camponotus, and leafcutter ants (Atta and Acromyrmex) offer compelling social systems to explore adaptive variation in gustation because of their pronounced division of labor in which morphologically, behaviorally, and neurally differentiated workers vary in feeding behavior. Research on ant gustation within and among species will advance our understanding of sensory systems and provide insight into the impact of taste on the evolution of species diversity and how social organization influences gustation.

AB - Ants have remarkably diverse diets and extraordinary species richness, making them an excellent model system to study the evolution of taste. In this entirely eusocial clade, food choice and the mechanisms that regulate feeding have both individual and social dimensions. How taste receptors and sensory processing drive food preferences to generate dietary breadth in ants is poorly understood. It is additionally unclear how elements of colony organization such as division of labor and social food flow impact the mechanistic basis and evolution of taste. Previous work on dipteran, lepidopteran, and hymenopteran gustatory systems, while foundational, provide limited insights into ant dietary specialization. Here we synthesize and analyze research on ant gustation to identify mechanisms, sociobiological correlates, and phylogenetic patterns. We discuss the current state of genomic analyses of taste and future research. We propose that strikingly polymorphic species of Pheidole, Cephalotes, Camponotus, and leafcutter ants (Atta and Acromyrmex) offer compelling social systems to explore adaptive variation in gustation because of their pronounced division of labor in which morphologically, behaviorally, and neurally differentiated workers vary in feeding behavior. Research on ant gustation within and among species will advance our understanding of sensory systems and provide insight into the impact of taste on the evolution of species diversity and how social organization influences gustation.

KW - diet

KW - foraging ecology

KW - Formicidae

KW - genomics

KW - gustatory receptors

KW - sensory shift

KW - taste perception

KW - worker polymorphism

KW - CANDIDATE TASTE RECEPTORS

KW - AMINO-ACID PREFERENCE

KW - LASIUS-NIGER

KW - CAMPONOTUS-COMPRESSUS

KW - ARTIFICIAL NECTARS

KW - ANTENNAL SENSILLA

KW - BITTER TASTE

KW - DRAFT GENOME

KW - HYMENOPTERA

KW - FORMICIDAE

U2 - 10.3389/fevo.2023.1175719

DO - 10.3389/fevo.2023.1175719

M3 - Review

VL - 11

JO - Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution

JF - Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution

SN - 2296-701X

M1 - 1175719

ER -