Peeters C, Ito F
Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique UMR 7625, Laboratoire d'Ecologie, Université Pierre-et-Marie Curie, 75005 Paris, France.
Annu Rev Entomol. 2001;46:601-30. doi: 10.1146/annurev.ento.46.1.601.
Social Hymenoptera show two contrasting strategies of colony reproduction. A reproductive female can raise the first generation of brood alone (independent foundation), or a colony can divide into autonomous parts in which the reproductive female is helped by sterile relatives (fission, budding, swarming). In independent-founding ants, queens can histolize their flight muscles after dispersal; in many species, large flight muscles and metabolic reserves reduce or eliminate the need for risky foraging trips during the vulnerable solitary stage. Colony division is a derived strategy, and we review the selective pressures leading to its occurrence in the different social taxa. In various ants, fission coexists with independent foundation, and alate queens are retained. However, in ants exhibiting obligate fission (e.g. all army ants and many Ponerinae), queens are permanently wingless (ergatoid), or the queen caste is missing altogether. When reproductive females are flightless, dispersal distances and colonization ability are reduced, and there are extensive modifications in mating behavior and resource allocation. We focus on the characteristics of fission in the phylogenetically primitive ants Ponerinae in which both ergatoid queens and gamergates occur. The ground-living habits of ants have permitted extensive changes in the phenotypes of their reproductive females, unlike in wasps and bees.
群居膜翅目昆虫表现出两种截然不同的蚁群繁殖策略。一只具有繁殖能力的雌虫可以独自培育第一代幼虫（独立建群），或者一个蚁群可以分成多个自主部分，其中具有繁殖能力的雌虫会得到不育亲属的帮助（分裂、出芽、分蜂群）。在独立建群的蚂蚁中，蚁后在扩散后可以使飞行肌肉组织化；在许多物种中，大型飞行肌肉和代谢储备减少或消除了在脆弱的独居阶段进行危险觅食之旅的必要性。蚁群分裂是一种衍生策略，我们回顾了导致其在不同社会分类群中出现的选择压力。在各种蚂蚁中，分裂与独立建群共存，有翅蚁后得以保留。然而，在表现出专性分裂的蚂蚁中（如所有行军蚁和许多猛蚁亚科蚂蚁），蚁后永远无翅（似工蚁型），或者完全没有蚁后等级。当具有繁殖能力的雌虫不能飞行时，扩散距离和定殖能力会降低，并且在交配行为和资源分配方面会有广泛的改变。我们关注系统发育上原始的猛蚁亚科蚂蚁的分裂特征，其中既存在似工蚁型蚁后，也存在合作生殖雌蚁。与黄蜂和蜜蜂不同，蚂蚁的地面生活习性使其具有繁殖能力的雌虫的表型发生了广泛变化。
