Natures wonders: multiple queen fire ant colony (Introduction)

by David Turell , Saturday, March 12, 2022, 21:10 (985 days ago) @ David Turell

Studying the genetic differences with single queen types:

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2022/03/220311095304.htm

"Red fire ants originally had only colonies with one queen. The team previously discovered that about one million years ago, a new social form evolved where colonies could have dozens of queens. A particular version of a large section of chromosome, named the "social supergene," includes the genetic information necessary to make workers accept more than one queen.

"Transfer of large amounts of genetic information across species is rare because of genetic incompatibilities. However, in this case, the advantages of having multiple queens overrode the incompatibilities, and the genetic material repeatedly spread to other species from the one source species in which this new social form evolved. The multiple-queen social form has advantages in several situations. For example, a multiple-queen colony has more workers and thus can outcompete a colony with only one queen. Furthermore, if there is a flood, a colony with multiple queens is less likely to become queenless.

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"'This research reveals how evolutionary innovations can spread across species. It also shows how evolution works at the level of DNA and chromosomes.

"'It was incredibly surprising to discover that other species could acquire a new form of social organisation through hybridisation. The supergene region that creates multi-queen colonies is a large piece of chromosome that contains hundreds of genes. The many parts of a genome evolve to work together in fine-tuned manners, thus suddenly having a mix with different versions of many genes from another species is complicated and quite rare."

Comment: interesting new hybrid fire ant is old. Not true speciation.