Note to users. If you're seeing this message, it means that your browser cannot find this page's style/presentation instructions -- or possibly that you are using a browser that does not support current Web standards. Find out more about why this message is appearing, and what you can do to make your experience of our site the best it can be.

Science 28 June 1985:
Vol. 228. no. 4707, pp. 1489 - 1495
DOI: 10.1126/science.228.4707.1489
Prev | Table of Contents | Next

Articles

The Sociogenesis of Insect Colonies

Edward O. Wilson 1

1 Professor of Science and Curator in Entomology, Museum of Comparative Zoology, Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02138.

Studies on the social insects (ants, bees, wasps, and termites) have focused increasingly on sociogenesis, the process by which colony members undergo changes in caste, behavior, and physical location incident to colonial development. Caste is determined in individuals largely by environmental cues that trigger a sequence of progressive physiological restrictions. Individual determination, which is socially mediated, yields an age-size frequency distribution of the worker population that enhances survival and reproduction of the colony as a whole, typically at the expense of individuals. This "adaptive demography" varies in a predictable manner according to the species and size of the colony. The demography is richly augmented by behavioral pacemaking on the part of certain castes and programmed changes in the physical position of colony members according to age and size. Much of what has been observed in these three colony-level traits (adaptive demography, pacemaking, and positional effects) can be interpreted as the product of ritualization of dominance and other forms of selfish behavior that is still found in the more primitive insect societies. Some of the processes can also be usefully compared with morphogenesis at the levels of cells and tissues.


THIS ARTICLE HAS BEEN CITED BY OTHER ARTICLES:
Location, location, location: larvae position inside the nest is correlated with adult body size in worker bumble-bees (Bombus impatiens).
M. J. Couvillon and A. Dornhaus (2009)
Proc R Soc B 276, 2411-2418
   Abstract »    Full Text »    PDF »
Ants (Formicidae): Models for Social Complexity.
C. R. Smith, A. Dolezal, D. Eliyahu, C. T. Holbrook, and J. Gadau (2009)
CSH Protocols 2009, pdb.emo125
   Abstract »    Full Text »
A genome-wide signature of positive selection in ancient and recent invasive expansions of the honey bee Apis mellifera.
A. Zayed and C. W. Whitfield (2008)
PNAS 105, 3421-3426
   Abstract »    Full Text »    PDF »
Spatial organization in a dimorphic ant: caste specificity of clustering patterns and area marking.
G. Sempo, S. Depickere, and C. Detrain (2006)
Behav. Ecol. 17, 642-650
   Abstract »    Full Text »    PDF »
Sex-ratio conflicts, kin selection, and the evolution of altruism.
W. J. Alonso and C. Schuck-Paim (2002)
PNAS 99, 6843-6847
   Abstract »    Full Text »    PDF »
Worker biting interactions and task performance in a swarm-founding eusocial wasp (Polybia occidentalis, Hymenoptera: Vespidae).
S. O'Donnell (2001)
Behav. Ecol. 12, 353-359
   Abstract »    Full Text »    PDF »
Changes in period mRNA levels in the brain and division of labor in honey bee colonies.
D. P. Toma, G. Bloch, D. Moore, and G. E. Robinson (2000)
PNAS 97, 6914-6919
   Abstract »    Full Text »    PDF »
Optimizing force and velocity: mandible muscle fibre attachments in ants.
J Paul and W Gronenberg (1999)
J. Exp. Biol. 202, 797-808
   Abstract »    PDF »
Hormonal and Genetic Control of Behavioral Integration in Honey Bee Colonies.
G. E. ROBINSON, R. E. PAGE JR., C. STRAMBI, and A. STRAMBI (1989)
Science 246, 109-112
   Abstract »    PDF »


To Advertise     Find Products

Science. ISSN 0036-8075 (print), 1095-9203 (online)