• DOI:10.1126/science.1156108
Corpus ID: 20388889

Ancestral Monogamy Shows Kin Selection Is Key to the Evolution of Eusociality

@article{Hughes2008AncestralMS,
  title={Ancestral Monogamy Shows Kin Selection Is Key to the Evolution of Eusociality},
  author={W. O. Hughes and B. Oldroyd and M. Beekman and F. Ratnieks},
  journal={Science},
  year={2008},
  volume={320},
  pages={1213 - 1216}
}

W. O. Hughes, B. Oldroyd, +1 author F. Ratnieks

Published 2008

Medicine, Biology

Science

Close relatedness has long been considered crucial to the evolution of eusociality. [...] Key Method We tested this idea with a comparative analysis of female mating frequencies in 267 species of eusocial bees, wasps, and ants. We found that mating with a single male, which maximizes relatedness, is ancestral for all eight independent eusocial lineages that we investigated. Mating with multiple males is always derived. Furthermore, we found that high polyandry (>2 effective mates) occurs only in lineages whose…Expand Abstract

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