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Corpse Management in Social Insects

Undertaking behavior is an essential adaptation to social life that is critical for colony hygiene in enclosed nests. Social insects dispose of dead individuals in various fashions to prevent further contact between corpses and living members in a colony. Focusing on three groups of eusocial insects...

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Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores principales: Sun, Qian, Zhou, Xuguo
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Ivyspring International Publisher 2013
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3619097/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23569436
http://dx.doi.org/10.7150/ijbs.5781
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author Sun, Qian
Zhou, Xuguo
author_facet Sun, Qian
Zhou, Xuguo
author_sort Sun, Qian
collection PubMed
description Undertaking behavior is an essential adaptation to social life that is critical for colony hygiene in enclosed nests. Social insects dispose of dead individuals in various fashions to prevent further contact between corpses and living members in a colony. Focusing on three groups of eusocial insects (bees, ants, and termites) in two phylogenetically distant orders (Hymenoptera and Isoptera), we review mechanisms of death recognition, convergent and divergent behavioral responses toward dead individuals, and undertaking task allocation from the perspective of division of labor. Distinctly different solutions (e.g., corpse removal, burial and cannibalism) have evolved, independently, in the holometabolous hymenopterans and hemimetabolous isopterans toward the same problem of corpse management. In addition, issues which can lead to a better understanding of the roles that undertaking behavior has played in the evolution of eusociality are discussed.
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spelling pubmed-36190972013-04-08 Corpse Management in Social Insects Sun, Qian Zhou, Xuguo Int J Biol Sci Review Undertaking behavior is an essential adaptation to social life that is critical for colony hygiene in enclosed nests. Social insects dispose of dead individuals in various fashions to prevent further contact between corpses and living members in a colony. Focusing on three groups of eusocial insects (bees, ants, and termites) in two phylogenetically distant orders (Hymenoptera and Isoptera), we review mechanisms of death recognition, convergent and divergent behavioral responses toward dead individuals, and undertaking task allocation from the perspective of division of labor. Distinctly different solutions (e.g., corpse removal, burial and cannibalism) have evolved, independently, in the holometabolous hymenopterans and hemimetabolous isopterans toward the same problem of corpse management. In addition, issues which can lead to a better understanding of the roles that undertaking behavior has played in the evolution of eusociality are discussed. Ivyspring International Publisher 2013-03-22 /pmc/articles/PMC3619097/ /pubmed/23569436 http://dx.doi.org/10.7150/ijbs.5781 Text en © Ivyspring International Publisher. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/). Reproduction is permitted for personal, noncommercial use, provided that the article is in whole, unmodified, and properly cited.
spellingShingle Review
Sun, Qian
Zhou, Xuguo
Corpse Management in Social Insects
title Corpse Management in Social Insects
title_full Corpse Management in Social Insects
title_fullStr Corpse Management in Social Insects
title_full_unstemmed Corpse Management in Social Insects
title_short Corpse Management in Social Insects
title_sort corpse management in social insects
topic Review
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3619097/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23569436
http://dx.doi.org/10.7150/ijbs.5781
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