Bladon Eleanor K, Pascoal Sonia, Kilner Rebecca M
Department of Zoology, University of Cambridge, Downing Street, Cambridge, CB2 3EJ, United Kingdom.
Department of Haematology, University of Cambridge, Long Road, Cambridge, CB2 0PT, United Kingdom.
Behav Ecol. 2024 Sep 25;35(6):arae074. doi: 10.1093/beheco/arae074. eCollection 2024 Nov-Dec.
Principles of social evolution have long been used retrospectively to interpret social interactions, but have less commonly been applied predictively to inform conservation and animal husbandry strategies. We investigate whether differences in developmental environment, facilitated by divergent social conditions, can predict resilience to environmental change. Upon exposure to harsh novel environments, populations that previously experienced more benign social environments are predicted either to suffer fitness losses (the "mutation load hypothesis" and "selection filter hypothesis") or maintain fitness (the "beneficial mutation hypothesis"). We tested these contrasting predictions using populations of burying beetles we had evolved experimentally for 45 generations under contrasting social environments by manipulating the supply of post-hatching parental care. We exposed sexually immature adults from each population to varying heat stress and measured the effect on survival and reproduction. The greater the level of parental care previously experienced by a population, the better its survival under heat stress during sexual maturation. Although this is consistent with the "beneficial mutation hypothesis," it is also possible that populations that had evolved without post-hatching care were simply more prone to dying during maturation, regardless of their thermal environment. Overall, we suggest that stochastic genetic variation, probably due to founder effects, had a stronger influence on resilience. We discuss the implications for translocation and captive breeding programs.
社会进化原理长期以来一直被用于追溯性地解释社会互动，但较少被前瞻性地应用于为保护和畜牧业策略提供信息。我们研究了由不同社会条件促成的发育环境差异是否能够预测对环境变化的恢复力。在暴露于恶劣的新环境时，先前经历过更良性社会环境的种群预计要么会遭受适合度损失（“突变负荷假说”和“选择过滤假说”），要么维持适合度（“有益突变假说”）。我们使用埋葬甲虫种群对这些相互矛盾的预测进行了测试，我们通过操纵孵化后亲代抚育的供给，在不同的社会环境下对埋葬甲虫进行了45代的实验进化。我们将每个种群中未达性成熟的成虫暴露于不同程度的热应激下，并测量其对生存和繁殖的影响。一个种群先前经历的亲代抚育水平越高，其在性成熟期间热应激下的存活率就越高。虽然这与“有益突变假说”一致，但也有可能是那些在没有孵化后抚育的情况下进化的种群，无论其热环境如何，在成熟过程中都更容易死亡。总体而言，我们认为可能由于奠基者效应导致的随机遗传变异对恢复力有更强的影响。我们讨论了这对转移和圈养繁殖计划的影响。
