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Co-founding ant queens prevent disease by performing prophylactic undertaking behaviour.
Christopher D Pull1,2, Sylvia Cremer3
1IST Austria (Institute of Science and Technology Austria), Am Campus 1, 3400, Klosterneuburg, Austria. chris.pull@rhul.ac.uk.
BMC Evolutionary Biology
|October 14, 2017
Summary
Ant queens do not avoid pathogen-exposed co-founders but perform undertaking behaviors to prevent disease spread. These actions, including corpse removal, protect surviving queens and enhance colony founding success.
Area of Science:
- Behavioral Ecology
- Social Immunity
- Insect Pathology
Background:
- Social insects in crowded, pathogen-rich environments rely on collective defenses.
- Colony-founding queens are vulnerable to pathogens without collective protection.
- Group colony founding increases disease transmission risk from infectious co-founders.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate if ant queens avoid founding colonies with pathogen-exposed individuals.
- To determine how ant queens limit disease transmission from infectious co-founders.
Main Methods:
- Experimentally exposed Lasius niger queens to the fungal pathogen Metarhizium brunneum.
- Observed colony founding behavior and responses to dead co-foundresses.
- Assessed the impact of undertaking behaviors on queen survival.
Main Results:
- Queens did not avoid founding colonies with pathogen-exposed conspecifics.
- Surviving queens exhibited biting, burial, and removal of dead co-foundresses.
- These undertaking behaviors, performed prophylactically, reduced disease transmission risk.
Conclusions:
- Co-founding ant queens engage in undertaking behaviors typically seen in workers.
- These infection avoidance behaviors improve queen survival and colony founding success.
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