Cargando…

Plastic responses of males and females interact to determine mating behavior

Individuals can respond plastically to variation in their social environment. However, each sex may respond to different cues and contrasting aspects of competition. Theory suggests that the plastic phenotype expressed by one sex can influence evolutionary dynamics in the other, and that plasticity...

Descripción completa

Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores principales: Fowler, Emily K., Leigh, Stewart, Bretman, Amanda, Chapman, Tracey
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: John Wiley and Sons Inc. 2022
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9544784/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/35880536
http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/evo.14568
_version_ 1784804675256582144
author Fowler, Emily K.
Leigh, Stewart
Bretman, Amanda
Chapman, Tracey
author_facet Fowler, Emily K.
Leigh, Stewart
Bretman, Amanda
Chapman, Tracey
author_sort Fowler, Emily K.
collection PubMed
description Individuals can respond plastically to variation in their social environment. However, each sex may respond to different cues and contrasting aspects of competition. Theory suggests that the plastic phenotype expressed by one sex can influence evolutionary dynamics in the other, and that plasticity simultaneously expressed by both sexes can exert sex‐specific effects on fitness. However, data are needed to test this theory base. Here, we examined whether the simultaneous expression of adaptive plasticity by both sexes of Drosophila melanogaster fruit flies in response to their respective social environments interacts to determine the value of key reproductive traits (mating latency, duration, and fecundity). To vary social environments, males were kept alone, or with same sex rivals, and females were kept alone, in same‐sex, or mixed‐sex groups. Matings were then conducted between individuals from all of these five social treatments in all combinations, and the resulting reproductive traits measured in both “choice” and “no‐choice” assays. Mating latency was determined by an interaction between the plastic responses of both sexes to their social environments. Interestingly, the mating latency response occurred in opposing directions in the different assays. In females exposed to same‐sex social treatments, mating latency was more rapid with rival treatment males in the choice assays, but slower with those same males in no‐choice assays. In contrast, mating duration was determined purely by responses of males to their social environments, and fecundity purely by responses of females. Collectively, the results show that plastic responses represent an important and novel facet of sexual interactions.
format Online
Article
Text
id pubmed-9544784
institution National Center for Biotechnology Information
language English
publishDate 2022
publisher John Wiley and Sons Inc.
record_format MEDLINE/PubMed
spelling pubmed-95447842022-10-14 Plastic responses of males and females interact to determine mating behavior Fowler, Emily K. Leigh, Stewart Bretman, Amanda Chapman, Tracey Evolution Original Articles Individuals can respond plastically to variation in their social environment. However, each sex may respond to different cues and contrasting aspects of competition. Theory suggests that the plastic phenotype expressed by one sex can influence evolutionary dynamics in the other, and that plasticity simultaneously expressed by both sexes can exert sex‐specific effects on fitness. However, data are needed to test this theory base. Here, we examined whether the simultaneous expression of adaptive plasticity by both sexes of Drosophila melanogaster fruit flies in response to their respective social environments interacts to determine the value of key reproductive traits (mating latency, duration, and fecundity). To vary social environments, males were kept alone, or with same sex rivals, and females were kept alone, in same‐sex, or mixed‐sex groups. Matings were then conducted between individuals from all of these five social treatments in all combinations, and the resulting reproductive traits measured in both “choice” and “no‐choice” assays. Mating latency was determined by an interaction between the plastic responses of both sexes to their social environments. Interestingly, the mating latency response occurred in opposing directions in the different assays. In females exposed to same‐sex social treatments, mating latency was more rapid with rival treatment males in the choice assays, but slower with those same males in no‐choice assays. In contrast, mating duration was determined purely by responses of males to their social environments, and fecundity purely by responses of females. Collectively, the results show that plastic responses represent an important and novel facet of sexual interactions. John Wiley and Sons Inc. 2022-08-12 2022-09 /pmc/articles/PMC9544784/ /pubmed/35880536 http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/evo.14568 Text en © 2022 The Authors. Evolution published by Wiley Periodicals LLC on behalf of The Society for the Study of Evolution. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/This is an open access article under the terms of the http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
spellingShingle Original Articles
Fowler, Emily K.
Leigh, Stewart
Bretman, Amanda
Chapman, Tracey
Plastic responses of males and females interact to determine mating behavior
title Plastic responses of males and females interact to determine mating behavior
title_full Plastic responses of males and females interact to determine mating behavior
title_fullStr Plastic responses of males and females interact to determine mating behavior
title_full_unstemmed Plastic responses of males and females interact to determine mating behavior
title_short Plastic responses of males and females interact to determine mating behavior
title_sort plastic responses of males and females interact to determine mating behavior
topic Original Articles
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9544784/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/35880536
http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/evo.14568
work_keys_str_mv AT fowleremilyk plasticresponsesofmalesandfemalesinteracttodeterminematingbehavior
AT leighstewart plasticresponsesofmalesandfemalesinteracttodeterminematingbehavior
AT bretmanamanda plasticresponsesofmalesandfemalesinteracttodeterminematingbehavior
AT chapmantracey plasticresponsesofmalesandfemalesinteracttodeterminematingbehavior