Université de Fribourg

Distinct genomic signals of lifespan and life history evolution in response to postponed reproduction and larval diet in Drosophila

Hoedjes, Katja M. ; van den Heuvel, Joost ; Kapun, Martin ; Keller, Laurent ; Flatt, Thomas ; Zwaan, Bas J.

In: Evolution Letters, 2019, p. -

Reproduction and diet are two major factors controlling the physiology of aging and life history, but how they interact to affect the evolution of longevity is unknown. Moreover, although studies of large‐effect mutants suggest an important role of nutrient sensing pathways in regulating aging, the genetic basis of evolutionary changes in lifespan remains poorly understood. To address these...

Université de Fribourg

Fitness and the level of homozygosity in a social insect

Haag-Liautard, Cathy ; Vitikainen, E. ; Keller, Laurent ; Sundström, L.

In: Journal of Evolutionary Biology, 2009, vol. 22, no. 1, p. 134 - 142

To date very few studies have addressed the effects of inbreeding in social Hymenoptera, perhaps because the costs of inbreeding are generally considered marginal owing to male haploidy whereby recessive deleterious alleles are strongly exposed to selection in males. Here, we present one of the first studies on the effects of queen and worker homozygosity on colony performance. In a wild...

Université de Fribourg

Breeding system and reproductive skew in a highly polygynous ant population

Haag-Liautard, Cathy ; Pedersen, J. S. ; Ovaskainen, O. ; Keller, Laurent

In: Insectes Sociaux, 2008, vol. 55, no. 4, p. 347-354

Factors affecting relatedness among nest members in ant colonies with high queen number are still poorly understood. In order to identify the major determinants of nest kin structure, we conducted a detailed analysis of the breeding system of the ant Formica exsecta. We estimated the number of mature queens by mark-release-recapture in 29 nests and dissected a sub-sample of queens to assess their...