DISSERTATION RESEARCH: Evolution of Alternative Mating Tactics in the Yellow Dung Fly

论文研究：黄粪蝇替代交配策略的演变

• 批准号: 1501328
• 负责人: Scott Pitnick
• 金额: $ 1.91万
• 依托单位: Syracuse University
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2015
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2015-07-01 至 2018-06-30
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1501328&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: DISSERTATION; RESEARCH; Evolution; Alternative; Mating

The process of evolution is expected to favor the single most successful behavioral tactic in a population and eliminate less successful options. Nevertheless, in some species, males adopt different behavioral tactics for acquiring mates, and it is unclear how males decide which tactic to adopt or what the reproductive consequences of this decision might be. In the yellow dung fly, some males compete with one another over access to females at breeding sites, whereas others search for feeding females in non-competitive environments. This study aims to understand the environmental and genetic factors that influence the choice of reproductive tactic in yellow dung fly males and how these alternative tactics are maintained within the same species. These results will help explain the wide diversity of animal traits observed within species throughout nature. Additionally, opportunities will be provided for high school and undergraduate students interested in biology to gain hands-on research experience by participating in data collection and analysis associated with this work.The co-occurrence of status-dependent alternative mating tactics is an example of extreme phenotypic variation persisting within a population. In addition to differences in mate securing behaviors and morphology, males of alternative tactics are also expected to differ in reproductive investment strategies due to tactic-specific variation in the degree of gametic competition that males face. The appropriate genetic model for understanding the evolution, maintenance, and expression of such phenotypic variation has long been the subject of intense debate. The "environmentally-cued threshold" model has recently emerged as a powerful quantitative genetics-based approach for investigating these long-standing questions. However, the difficulty of accurately quantifying lifetime fitness associated with each tactic has restricted its use in empirical studies. This research will overcome these obstacles by using large, experimental enclosures that simulate field conditions, as well as molecular analyses for paternity assignment, to assess lifespan and reproductive success associated with the size-dependent expression of alternative mating tactics in the yellow dung fly, Scathophaga stercoraria, which is a model system for behavioral ecology. All behavioral, morphological, and genetic data obtained from this research will be deposited into a public repository such as Dryad.

预计进化过程将偏爱人群中最成功的行为策略，并消除较少成功的选择。然而，在某些物种中，雄性采取不同的行为策略来获得伴侣，目前尚不清楚男性如何决定采用哪种策略或该决定的生殖后果。在黄色的粪便中，有些雄性在繁殖场所互相接触女性，而另一些男性则在非竞争环境中寻找喂养女性。这项研究旨在了解影响黄色粪便男性生殖策略选择的环境和遗传因素，以及如何在同一物种中维持这些替代策略。这些结果将有助于解释整个物种中观察到的动物特征的广泛多样性。此外，将为对生物学感兴趣的高中和本科生提供机会，通过参与与这项工作相关的数据收集和分析来获得动手研究经验。表型变异在人群中持续存在。除了确保行为和形态的伴侣的差异外，由于男性面临的配子竞争程度，由于战术特定的差异，替代策略的男性在生殖投资策略上也有所不同。长期以来，这种表型变异的演变，维持和表达的适当遗传模型长期以来一直是激烈争论的主题。 “环保阈值”模型最近成为一种强大的基于定量遗传学的方法，用于研究这些长期存在的问题。但是，准确量化与每种策略相关的寿命适应性的困难限制了其在经验研究中的使用。这项研究将通过使用模拟田间条件的大型实验围墙以及分子分析进行亲子鉴定来克服这些障碍Stercoraria，这是行为生态学的模型系统。从这项研究中获得的所有行为，形态和遗传数据都将沉积在公共存储库中，例如Dryad。