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Download fileBehavioural effects of juvenile hormone and their influence on division of labour in leaf-cutting ant societies
journal contribution
posted on 2023-06-09, 00:32 authored by Victoria C Norman, William HughesWilliam HughesDivision of labour in social insects represents a major evolutionary transition, but the physiological mechanisms that regulate this are still little understood. Experimental work with honey bees, and correlational analyses in other social insects, have implicated juvenile hormone (JH) as a regulatory factor, but direct experimental evidence of behavioural effects of JH in social insects is generally lacking. Here, we used experimental manipulation of JH to show that raised JH levels in leaf-cutting ants results in workers becoming more active, phototactic and threat responsive, and engaging in more extranidal activity – behavioural changes that we show are all characteristic of the transition from intranidal work to foraging. These behavioural effects on division of labour suggest that the JH mediation of behaviour occurs across multiple independent evolutions of eusociality, and may be a key endocrine regulator of the division of labour which has produced the remarkable ecological and evolutionary success of social insects.
Funding
DTA - Determining the environmental and genetic basis of phenotypic plasiticity in leaf-cutting ants; G1011; BBSRC-BIOTECHNOLOGY & BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES RESEARCH COUNCIL; BB/J011339/1
Phenotypic plasticity in leaf-cutting ants; G0977; SYNGENTA LIMITED
History
Publication status
- Published
File Version
- Published version
Journal
Journal of Experimental BiologyISSN
0022-0949Publisher
Company of BiologistsExternal DOI
Issue
1Volume
219Page range
8-11Department affiliated with
- Evolution, Behaviour and Environment Publications
Full text available
- Yes
Peer reviewed?
- Yes