1 Centre for Biodiversity and Environment Research, University College London , Gower Street, London WC1E 6BT , UK.
2 Dipartimento di Biologia, Università degli Studi di Firenze , Via Madonna del Piano, 6, 50019 Sesto Fiorentino , Italy.
Philos Trans R Soc Lond B Biol Sci. 2019 Apr 1;374(1769):20180193. doi: 10.1098/rstb.2018.0193.
Insect societies play a crucial role in the functioning of most ecosystems and have fascinated both scientists and the lay public for centuries. Despite the long history of study, we are still far from understanding how insect societies have evolved and how social cohesion in their colonies is maintained. Here we suggest inquiline social parasites of insect societies as an under-exploited experimental tool for understanding sociality. We draw on examples from obligate inquiline (permanent) social parasites in wasps, ants and bees to illustrate how these parasites may allow us to better understand societies and learn more about the evolution and functioning of insect societies. We highlight three main features of these social parasite-host systems-namely, close phylogenetic relationships, strong selective pressures arising from coevolution and multiple independent origins-that make inquiline social parasites particularly suited for this aim; we propose a conceptual comparative framework that considers trait losses, gains and modifications in social parasite-host systems. We give examples of how this framework can reveal the more elusive secrets of sociality by focusing on two cornerstones of sociality: communication and reproductive division of labour. Together with social parasites in other taxonomic groups, such as cuckoos in birds, social parasitism has a great potential to reveal the mechanisms and evolution of complex social groups. This article is part of the theme issue 'The coevolutionary biology of brood parasitism: from mechanism to pattern'.
昆虫社会在大多数生态系统的运作中起着至关重要的作用，几个世纪以来一直令科学家和普通大众着迷。尽管研究历史悠久，但我们仍远未了解昆虫社会是如何进化的，以及它们的群体如何保持社会凝聚力。在这里，我们建议将昆虫社会的拟寄生物作为理解社会性的一种未充分利用的实验工具。我们以黄蜂、蚂蚁和蜜蜂中强制性拟寄生物（永久）为例，说明这些寄生虫如何帮助我们更好地了解社会，并更多地了解昆虫社会的进化和功能。我们强调了这些寄生虫-宿主系统的三个主要特征——即密切的系统发育关系、共同进化产生的强烈选择压力和多个独立起源——这使得拟寄生物特别适合这一目的；我们提出了一个概念性的比较框架，该框架考虑了寄生虫-宿主系统中特征的丧失、获得和改变。我们通过关注社会性的两个基石——交流和生殖劳动分工，举例说明了该框架如何通过聚焦于社会寄生虫来揭示更难以捉摸的社会性秘密。与鸟类中的杜鹃等其他分类群中的社会寄生虫一起，社会寄生具有揭示复杂社会群体的机制和进化的巨大潜力。本文是主题为“巢寄生的协同进化生物学：从机制到模式”的特刊的一部分。
