Department of Entomology, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, USA.
Mol Phylogenet Evol. 2012 Dec;65(3):926-39. doi: 10.1016/j.ympev.2012.08.013. Epub 2012 Sep 7.
The halictid bees are excellent models for the study of social evolution because greater social diversity and plasticity are observed in the tribe Halictini than in any other comparable taxonomic group. We examine the evolutionary relationships within the subfamily Halictinae ("sweat bees") to investigate the origins of social behaviour within the tribe Halictini. We present a new phylogeny of the subfamily Halictinae based on three nuclear genes (elongation factor-1 alpha, wingless, and long-wavelength rhodopsin) and one mitochondrial gene (cytochrome c oxidase 1) sequenced for 206 halictine bees. We use model-based character reconstruction to infer the probability of a shared eusocial ancestor for the genera Halictus and Lasioglossum, the two genera of Halictini which display eusociality. Our results suggest a high probability for a single origin of eusociality for these two genera, contradicting earlier views of separate origins within each taxon. Fossil-calibrated divergence estimates place this ancestor at approximately 35 million years ago, about 14 million years earlier than previous estimates of eusocial origins in the halictid bees.
叶蜂科的蜜蜂是研究社会进化的绝佳模式，因为在 Halictini 部落中观察到的社会多样性和可塑性大于任何其他可比的分类群。我们研究了 Halictinae 亚科（“汗蜂”）内的进化关系，以调查 Halictini 部落内社会行为的起源。我们根据三个核基因（延伸因子 1α、无翅和长波视蛋白）和一个线粒体基因（细胞色素 c 氧化酶 1）为 206 只叶蜂科蜜蜂测序，提出了一个新的 Halictinae 亚科系统发育。我们使用基于模型的特征重建来推断 Halictus 和 Lasioglossum 这两个具有社会性的 Halictini 属是否具有共同的真社会性祖先。我们的结果表明，这两个属的真社会性起源极有可能是单一的，这与之前每个分类单元内起源独立的观点相矛盾。化石校准的分歧估计将这个祖先置于大约 3500 万年前，比叶蜂科真社会性起源的先前估计早约 1400 万年。
