Now there is a video about the biggest ant paper of the year.
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For those playing along at home, what's the link to the paper?
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@futurebird @stuartyeates This is the wildest thing I've read in a long time
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F myrmepropagandist shared this topic
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@futurebird @stuartyeates This is the wildest thing I've read in a long time
@Quantensalat @futurebird @stuartyeates
it's been blowing my mind for days. But ... we all know branching points in evolution need to happen somehow, and we all know most of the hows are unknown. This is one of the hows. -
@Quantensalat @futurebird @stuartyeates
it's been blowing my mind for days. But ... we all know branching points in evolution need to happen somehow, and we all know most of the hows are unknown. This is one of the hows.@llewelly @Quantensalat @futurebird
Makes you wonder how frequently this kind of thing happens but we don't notice due to our Victorian framing of sex.
There could easily be a million "species" doing this (and more) and we just haven't noticed.
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Now there is a video about the biggest ant paper of the year.
@futurebird So, do the queens of one species store the DNA of males of the other species so they can clone it? And does that DNA get passed from one queen to another over the generations..?
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@futurebird So, do the queens of one species store the DNA of males of the other species so they can clone it? And does that DNA get passed from one queen to another over the generations..?
@futurebird Oh, does the Messor Ibericus colony keep a supply of Messor Structor clones around? And have they been cloning them for millions of years..?!
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@futurebird Oh, does the Messor Ibericus colony keep a supply of Messor Structor clones around? And have they been cloning them for millions of years..?!
I'm still trying to wrap my head around the details of this but it seems like they have been doing this for millions of years.
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@llewelly @Quantensalat @futurebird
Makes you wonder how frequently this kind of thing happens but we don't notice due to our Victorian framing of sex.
There could easily be a million "species" doing this (and more) and we just haven't noticed.
@stuartyeates @llewelly @Quantensalat
Stuart, Llewelly can you you help me understand this bit from the paper?
"This strategy may have been selected either to benefit from potential worker hybrid vigour or to prevent queen-only production due to the fixation of a caste-biasing genotype"
It's in the section about "Maintenance of a clonal lineage of males"
I understand the hybrid vigor bit, but what do they mean by "fixation of a caste-biasing genotype" ?
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@stuartyeates @llewelly @Quantensalat
Stuart, Llewelly can you you help me understand this bit from the paper?
"This strategy may have been selected either to benefit from potential worker hybrid vigour or to prevent queen-only production due to the fixation of a caste-biasing genotype"
It's in the section about "Maintenance of a clonal lineage of males"
I understand the hybrid vigor bit, but what do they mean by "fixation of a caste-biasing genotype" ?
@stuartyeates @llewelly @Quantensalat
They are talking about the evolutionary benefits of Social Hybridogenesis. What's going on with these ants goes beyond Social Hybridogenesis.
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@stuartyeates @llewelly @Quantensalat
They are talking about the evolutionary benefits of Social Hybridogenesis. What's going on with these ants goes beyond Social Hybridogenesis.
@stuartyeates @llewelly @Quantensalat
This paper does the same thing many math papers (and talks) do. They start out obviously trying to write for the more general audience. Explaining all of the basic concepts as they come up. But, when they get into the exciting bit they become giddy and stop breaking everything down with as much care.
It's that meme where a student is in a math class and the board says "1+1=2" then she looks away for one second and looks back and it's full of calculus.
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@stuartyeates @llewelly @Quantensalat
This paper does the same thing many math papers (and talks) do. They start out obviously trying to write for the more general audience. Explaining all of the basic concepts as they come up. But, when they get into the exciting bit they become giddy and stop breaking everything down with as much care.
It's that meme where a student is in a math class and the board says "1+1=2" then she looks away for one second and looks back and it's full of calculus.
@stuartyeates @llewelly @Quantensalat
But I am like a snow plow, I will figure this out.
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@stuartyeates @llewelly @Quantensalat
Stuart, Llewelly can you you help me understand this bit from the paper?
"This strategy may have been selected either to benefit from potential worker hybrid vigour or to prevent queen-only production due to the fixation of a caste-biasing genotype"
It's in the section about "Maintenance of a clonal lineage of males"
I understand the hybrid vigor bit, but what do they mean by "fixation of a caste-biasing genotype" ?
@futurebird @stuartyeates @Quantensalat I don't understand that part either. Maybe, by "prevent queen-only production" they are hypothesizing that without the M. structor sperm the queens could only produce queens, and not workers or males? I'm not sure that's what they meant, it's only a guess.
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@stuartyeates @llewelly @Quantensalat
But I am like a snow plow, I will figure this out.
@futurebird @stuartyeates @llewelly
I'll be delighted if you can explain it afterwards
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@stuartyeates @llewelly @Quantensalat
Stuart, Llewelly can you you help me understand this bit from the paper?
"This strategy may have been selected either to benefit from potential worker hybrid vigour or to prevent queen-only production due to the fixation of a caste-biasing genotype"
It's in the section about "Maintenance of a clonal lineage of males"
I understand the hybrid vigor bit, but what do they mean by "fixation of a caste-biasing genotype" ?
@futurebird @stuartyeates @llewelly @Quantensalat
I haven't read the paper, but I'd interpret it to mean that the species may have developed such a strong tendency to suppress reproductive male offspring in favour of reproductive females that it risked becoming fixed in parthenogenetic reproduction with no males. This is true of various insect lineages. Having an external source of sperm would ensure sexual reproduction can continue.
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@futurebird @stuartyeates @llewelly @Quantensalat
I haven't read the paper, but I'd interpret it to mean that the species may have developed such a strong tendency to suppress reproductive male offspring in favour of reproductive females that it risked becoming fixed in parthenogenetic reproduction with no males. This is true of various insect lineages. Having an external source of sperm would ensure sexual reproduction can continue.
@dhobern @stuartyeates @llewelly @Quantensalat
That makes sense. I'm still confused about what a "caste-biasing genotype" is. I assume caste here means the reproductive caste of queen. So, if they became ants that just used queen producing parthenogenesis and there were no males that would be a "cast-biased genotype" which reduces species adaptability and all of the other benefits of sexual reproduction?
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@dhobern @stuartyeates @llewelly @Quantensalat
That makes sense. I'm still confused about what a "caste-biasing genotype" is. I assume caste here means the reproductive caste of queen. So, if they became ants that just used queen producing parthenogenesis and there were no males that would be a "cast-biased genotype" which reduces species adaptability and all of the other benefits of sexual reproduction?
@dhobern @stuartyeates @llewelly @Quantensalat
Also, this paper has caused me to wonder if there are some further or unique benefits to hybridization for eusocial animals: mainly that this strategy can also help ensure that it's only the queen whose eggs can continue the lineage. I wonder what happens to the hybrid workers eggs if they ever lay any. It seem to create a more extreme distinction between the reproductive and worker castes. But, I need to keep reading.
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@dhobern @stuartyeates @llewelly @Quantensalat
That makes sense. I'm still confused about what a "caste-biasing genotype" is. I assume caste here means the reproductive caste of queen. So, if they became ants that just used queen producing parthenogenesis and there were no males that would be a "cast-biased genotype" which reduces species adaptability and all of the other benefits of sexual reproduction?
@futurebird @dhobern @stuartyeates @Quantensalat I'm not sure what it means either, but it does seem "only produces queens" is a caste-biasing phenotype, but since that's exactly one caste, it's an extreme end-member, at least to me. So biased towards a specific caste, there are no other castes.
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@dhobern @stuartyeates @llewelly @Quantensalat
That makes sense. I'm still confused about what a "caste-biasing genotype" is. I assume caste here means the reproductive caste of queen. So, if they became ants that just used queen producing parthenogenesis and there were no males that would be a "cast-biased genotype" which reduces species adaptability and all of the other benefits of sexual reproduction?
@futurebird @stuartyeates @llewelly @Quantensalat
Yes. Imagine genetic variation within the species. Adding some queens produce male and queen offspring in a "normal" ratio, but some queens evolve to bias progeny to produce extra queens. The latter may propagate more of their genes so may be more evolutionarily successful. The risk is that this is a runaway process that ends with only the biased genotype continuing to exist in the population. At that point the biased genotype is said to be fixed.
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@futurebird @stuartyeates @llewelly
I'll be delighted if you can explain it afterwards
@Quantensalat @futurebird @stuartyeates @llewelly fwiw, I'm an evolutionary biologist by profession (more molecular than population, tho), and can try to clarify anything that gives your snow plow trouble. Though I know essentially nothing about ants.
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@Quantensalat @futurebird @stuartyeates @llewelly fwiw, I'm an evolutionary biologist by profession (more molecular than population, tho), and can try to clarify anything that gives your snow plow trouble. Though I know essentially nothing about ants.
@Quantensalat @futurebird @stuartyeates @llewelly somehow missed the whole thread and didn't see @dhobern there answering your specific question.
