scholarly journals Spatial environmental complexity mediates sexual conflict and sexual selection in Drosophila melanogaster

2019 ◽  
Vol 9 (5) ◽  
pp. 2651-2663 ◽  
Author(s):  
Heather L. Malek ◽  
Tristan A. F. Long
Keyword(s):  
Drosophila Melanogaster ◽  
Sexual Selection ◽  
Sexual Conflict ◽  
Environmental Complexity

scholarly journals The effects of male harm vary with female quality and environmental complexity in Drosophila melanogaster

2018 ◽  
Vol 14 (8) ◽  
pp. 20180443 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alison MacPherson ◽  
Li Yun ◽  
Tania S. Barrera ◽  
Aneil F. Agrawal ◽  
Howard D. Rundle
Keyword(s):  
Drosophila Melanogaster ◽  
Sexual Selection ◽  
Natural Selection ◽  
Sexual Conflict ◽  
Mate Competition ◽  
Environmental Complexity ◽  
High Quality ◽  
Female Quality ◽  
Behavioural Interactions ◽  
Recent Attention

Mate competition provides the opportunity for sexual selection which often acts strongly on males, but also the opportunity for sexual conflict that can alter natural selection on females. Recent attention has focused on the potential of sexual conflict to weaken selection on females if male sexual attention, and hence harm, is disproportionately directed towards high- over low-quality females, thereby reducing the fitness difference between these females. However, sexual conflict could instead strengthen selection on females if low-quality females are more sensitive to male harm than high-quality females, thereby magnifying fitness differences between them. We quantify the effects of male exposure on low- versus high-quality females in Drosophila melanogaster in each of two environments (‘simple’ and ‘complex’) that are known to alter behavioural interactions. We show that the effects of male harm are greater for low- compared to high-quality females in the complex but not the simple environment, consistent with mate competition strengthening selection on females in the former but not in the latter environment.

scholarly journals Assessing sexual conflict in the Drosophila melanogaster laboratory model system

2006 ◽  
Vol 361 (1466) ◽  
pp. 287-299 ◽  
Author(s):  
William R Rice ◽  
Andrew D Stewart ◽  
Edward H Morrow ◽  
Jodell E Linder ◽  
Nicole Orteiza ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Drosophila Melanogaster ◽  
Sexual Selection ◽  
Sexual Conflict ◽  
Graphical Model ◽  
Direct Costs ◽  
Model System ◽  
Laboratory Model ◽  
Laboratory Populations ◽  
Spatial Refuge ◽  
Sexually Antagonistic Coevolution

We describe a graphical model of interlocus coevolution used to distinguish between the interlocus sexual conflict that leads to sexually antagonistic coevolution, and the intrinsic conflict over mating rate that is an integral part of traditional models of sexual selection. We next distinguish the ‘laboratory island’ approach from the study of both inbred lines and laboratory populations that are newly derived from nature, discuss why we consider it to be one of the most fitting forms of laboratory analysis to study interlocus sexual conflict, and then describe four experiments using this approach with Drosophila melanogaster . The first experiment evaluates the efficacy of the laboratory model system to study interlocus sexual conflict by comparing remating rates of females when they are, or are not, provided with a spatial refuge from persistent male courtship. The second experiment tests for a lag-load in males that is due to adaptations that have accumulated in females, which diminish male-induced harm while simultaneously interfering with a male's ability to compete in the context of sexual selection. The third and fourth experiments test for a lag-load in females owing to direct costs from their interactions with males, and for the capacity for indirect benefits to compensate for these direct costs.

Sexual selection affects the evolution of contact pheromones in Drosophila melanogaster populations isolated by differential sexual conflict

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rochishnu Dutta ◽  
Tejinder Singh Chechi ◽  
N. G. Prasad
Keyword(s):  
Drosophila Melanogaster ◽  
Sexual Selection ◽  
Reproductive Isolation ◽  
Sexual Conflict ◽  
Population Differentiation ◽  
Lipid Profiles ◽  
Mate Preference ◽  
Cuticular Lipid ◽  
Antagonistic Coevolution ◽  
Sexually Antagonistic Coevolution

Abstract Background: The ability of sexual conflict to facilitate reproductive isolation is widely anticipated. However, very few experimental evolutionary studies have convincingly demonstrated the evolution of reproductive isolation due to sexual conflict. Recently a study on the replicates of Drosophila melanogaster populations under differential sexual conflict found that divergent mate preference evolved among replicates under high sexual conflict regime. The precopulatory isolating mechanism underlying such divergent mate preference could be sexual signals such as cuticular lipids since they evolve rapidly and are involved in D. melanogaster mate recognition. Using Drosophila melanogaster replicates used in the previous study, we investigate whether cuticular lipid divergence bears signatures of sexually antagonistic coevolution that led to reproductive isolation among replicates of high sexual conflict regime. Results: We found that their cuticular lipid profiles are sexually dimorphic. Although replicates with male biased sex ratio evolved isolation in reproductive traits due to high sexual conflict, the patterns of cuticular lipid divergence in high and low sexual conflict regimes suggest that sexual selection is the dominant selection pressure rather than sexual conflict affecting the cuticular lipid profile. We also find cuticular lipid divergence patterns to be suggestive of the Buridan’s Ass regime which is one of the six possible mechanism to resolve sexual conflict. Conclusions: Although reproductive isolation due to sexual conflict is anticipated, evolution of a sexually selected trait under sexual conflict may not lead to population differentiation in expected lines. This is because speciation due to sexually antagonistic coevolution is only one of the several outcomes of sexual conflict. This study indicates that population differentiation as a result of cuticular lipid divergence cannot be credited to sexual conflict despite high sexual conflict regime evolving divergent cuticular lipid profiles.

Reproductive behavior

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rachel Olzer ◽  
Rebecca L. Ehrlich ◽  
Justa L. Heinen-Kay ◽  
Jessie Tanner ◽  
Marlene Zuk
Keyword(s):  
Sexual Selection ◽  
Sexual Conflict ◽  
Female Choice ◽  
Reproductive Behavior ◽  
Mating Systems ◽  
Insect Behavior ◽  
Sequential Approach ◽  
Evolutionary Mechanisms ◽  
Anatomy And Physiology ◽  
Males And Females

Sex and reproduction lie at the heart of studies of insect behavior. We begin by providing a brief overview of insect anatomy and physiology, followed by an introduction to the overarching themes of parental investment, sexual selection, and mating systems. We then take a sequential approach to illustrate the diversity of phenomena and concepts behind insect reproductive behavior from pre-copulatory mate signalling through copulatory sperm transfer, mating positions, and sexual conflict, to post-copulatory sperm competition, and cryptic female choice. We provide an overview of the evolutionary mechanisms driving reproductive behavior. These events are linked by the economic defendability of mates or resources, and how these are allocated in each sex. Under the framework of economic defendability, the reader can better understand how sexual antagonistic behaviors arise as the result of competing optimal fitness strategies between males and females.

scholarly journals The physical environment mediates male harm and its effect on selection in females

2017 ◽  
Vol 284 (1858) ◽  
pp. 20170424 ◽  
Author(s):  
Li Yun ◽  
Patrick J. Chen ◽  
Amardeep Singh ◽  
Aneil F. Agrawal ◽  
Howard D. Rundle
Keyword(s):  
Drosophila Melanogaster ◽  
Sexual Selection ◽  
Physical Environment ◽  
Selective Advantage ◽  
Laboratory Studies ◽  
Male Choice ◽  
Female Fitness ◽  
High Quality ◽  
Evolutionary Consequences ◽  
Natural And Sexual Selection

Recent experiments indicate that male preferential harassment of high-quality females reduces the variance in female fitness, thereby weakening natural selection through females and hampering adaptation and purging. We propose that this phenomenon, which results from a combination of male choice and male-induced harm, should be mediated by the physical environment in which intersexual interactions occur. Using Drosophila melanogaster , we examined intersexual interactions in small and simple (standard fly vials) versus slightly more realistic (small cages with spatial structure) environments. We show that in these more realistic environments, sexual interactions are less frequent, are no longer biased towards high-quality females, and that overall male harm is reduced. Next, we examine the selective advantage of high- over low-quality females while manipulating the opportunity for male choice. Male choice weakens the viability advantage of high-quality females in the simple environment, consistent with previous work, but strengthens selection on females in the more realistic environment. Laboratory studies in simple environments have strongly shaped our understanding of sexual conflict but may provide biased insight. Our results suggest that the physical environment plays a key role in the evolutionary consequences of sexual interactions and ultimately the alignment of natural and sexual selection.

scholarly journals Absence of reproduction-immunity trade-off in male Drosophila melanogaster evolving under differential sexual selection

2020 ◽  
Vol 20 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Zeeshan Ali Syed ◽  
Vanika Gupta ◽  
Manas Geeta Arun ◽  
Aatashi Dhiman ◽  
Bodhisatta Nandy ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Drosophila Melanogaster ◽  
Sexual Selection ◽  
Trade Off

scholarly journals The Reproductive Microbiome: An Emerging Driver of Sexual Selection, Sexual Conflict, Mating Systems, and Reproductive Isolation

2020 ◽  
Vol 35 (3) ◽  
pp. 220-234 ◽  
Author(s):  
Melissah Rowe ◽  
Liisa Veerus ◽  
Pål Trosvik ◽  
Angus Buckling ◽  
Tommaso Pizzari
Keyword(s):  
Sexual Selection ◽  
Reproductive Isolation ◽  
Sexual Conflict ◽  
Mating Systems

scholarly journals Sexual selection favours good or bad genes for pathogen resistance depending on males' pathogen exposure

2019 ◽  
Vol 286 (1902) ◽  
pp. 20190226 ◽  
Author(s):  
Patrick Joye ◽  
Tadeusz J. Kawecki
Keyword(s):  
Drosophila Melanogaster ◽  
Sexual Selection ◽  
Female Choice ◽  
Experimental Studies ◽  
Pathogen Resistance ◽  
Condition Dependence ◽  
Indirect Benefit ◽  
Intestinal Pathogen ◽  
Sexual Traits ◽  
Pathogen Exposure

Resistance to pathogens is often invoked as an indirect benefit of female choice, but experimental evidence for links between father's sexual success and offspring resistance is scarce and equivocal. Two proposed mechanisms might generate such links. Under the first, heritable resistance to diverse pathogens depends on general immunocompetence; owing to shared condition dependence, male sexual traits indicate immunocompetence independently of the male's pathogen exposure. By contrast, other hypotheses (e.g. Hamilton–Zuk) assume that sexual traits only reveal heritable resistance if the males have been exposed to the pathogen. The distinction between the two mechanisms has been neglected by experimental studies. We show that Drosophila melanogaster males that are successful in mating contests (one female with two males) sire sons that are substantially more resistant to the intestinal pathogen Pseudomonas entomophila —but only if the males have themselves been exposed to the pathogen before the mating contest. By contrast, sons of males sexually successful in the absence of pathogen exposure are less resistant than sons of unsuccessful males. We detected no differences in daughters’ resistance. Thus, while sexual selection may have considerable consequences for offspring resistance, these consequences may be sex-specific. Furthermore, contrary to the ‘general immunocompetence’ hypothesis, these consequences can be positive or negative depending on the epidemiological context under which sexual selection operates.

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