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637 results for “Selection: sexual”

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dryad28/100

Data from: Patterns of paternity skew among polyandrous social insects: What can they tell us about the potential for sexual selection?

Monogamy results in high genetic relatedness among offspring and thus it is generally assumed to be favoured by kin selection. Female multiple mating (polyandry) has nevertheless evolved several times in the social Hymenoptera (ants, bees and wasps), and a substantial amount of work has been conducted to understand its costs and benefits. Relatedness and inclusive fitness benefits are, however, not only influenced by queen mating frequency but also by paternity skew, which is a quantitative measure of paternity biases among the offspring of polyandrous females. We performed a large scale phylogenetic analysis of paternity skew across polyandrous social Hymenoptera. We found a general and significant negative association between paternity frequency and paternity skew. High paternity skew, which increases relatedness amongst colony members and thus maximizes inclusive fitness gains, characterized species with low paternity frequency. However, species with highly polyandrous queens had low paternity skew, with paternity equalized amongst potential sires. Equal paternity shares among fathers are expected to maximize fitness benefits derived from genetic diversity among offspring. We discuss the potential for post-copulatory sexual selection to influence patterns of paternity in social insects, and suggest that sexual selection may have played a key, yet overlooked role in social evolution.

opencc-zeroDec 2011View details →

dryad28/100

Data from: Mate competition and resource competition are inter-related in sexual selection

Sexual selection can be affected by the competition for limited breeding resources and/or the competition for limited mates. Although there is ample evidence for each type of competition by itself, little is known about their relative importance and interaction. To address these questions, we established 48 experimental breeding populations of the two-spotted goby (Gobiusculus flavescens), a substrate-breeding fish with paternal care. In three experimental treatments, males were limited in the access to either nest sites or mates or were provided with both nests and mates in excess. We quantified male competition behaviour (agonistic and courtship), the opportunity for selection and selection on male body size. Limited access to nests and mates produced similar opportunities for selection, but only limited access to mates increased male competitive behaviours and caused positive selection on male body size. Selection on body size in the mate-limited treatment was due both to larger males being more likely to take up nests and to larger males being more likely to mate once they had a nest. These findings demonstrate that resource and mate limitation can differ in their effects on sexual selection. The results also reveal that resource and mating competition can be highly inter-related and not always separated in time, implying that methods to disentangle the two processes must be chosen with care. Future research should consider experimental and analytical approaches similar to those of the present study in attempts to elucidate the interaction of resource and mating competition in animals.

opencc-zeroDec 2012View details →

dryad28/100

Data from: Sex-linked genomic variation and its relationship to avian plumage dichromatism and sexual selection

Background: Sexual dichromatism is the tendency for sexes to differ in color pattern and represents a striking form of within-species morphological variation. Conspicuous intersexual differences in avian plumage are generally thought to result from Darwinian sexual selection, to the extent that dichromatism is often treated as a surrogate for the intensity of sexual selection in phylogenetic comparative studies. Intense sexual selection is predicted to leave a footprint on genetic evolution by reducing the relative genetic diversity on sex chromosome to that on the autosomes. Results: In this study, we test the association between plumage dichromatism and sex-linked genetic diversity using eight species pairs with contrasting levels of dichromatism. We estimated Z-linked and autosomal genetic diversity for these non-model avian species using restriction-site associated (RAD) loci that covered ~3 % of the genome. We find that monochromatic birds consistently have reduced sex-linked genomic variation relative to phylogenetically-paired dichromatic species and this pattern is robust to mutational biases. Conclusions: Our results are consistent with several interpretations. If present-day sexual selection is stronger in dichromatic birds, our results suggest that its impact on sex-linked genomic variation is offset by other processes that lead to proportionately lower Z-linked variation in monochromatic species. We discuss possible factors that may contribute to this discrepancy between phenotypes and genomic variation. Conversely, it is possible that present-day sexual selection -- as measured by the variance in male reproductive success -- is stronger in the set of monochromatic taxa we have examined, potentially reflecting the importance of song, behavior and other non-plumage associated traits as targets of sexual selection. This counterintuitive finding suggests that the relationship between genomic variation and sexual selection is complex and highlights the need for a more comprehensive survey of genomic variation in avian taxa that vary markedly in social and genetic mating systems.

opencc-zeroDec 2014View details →

dryad28/100