EVOCOOP

Multi-level analysis of the evolution of cooperative behaviour in social insects

 Coordinatore ROYAL HOLLOWAY AND BEDFORD NEW COLLEGE 

 Organization address address: EGHAM HILL UNIVERSITY OF LONDON
city: EGHAM
postcode: TW20 0EX

contact info
Titolo: Prof.
Nome: Mark
Cognome: Brown
Email: send email
Telefono: +44 782 584 0858

 Nazionalità Coordinatore United Kingdom [UK]
 Totale costo 221˙606 €
 EC contributo 221˙606 €
 Programma FP7-PEOPLE
Specific programme "People" implementing the Seventh Framework Programme of the European Community for research, technological development and demonstration activities (2007 to 2013)
 Code Call FP7-PEOPLE-2013-IIF
 Funding Scheme MC-IIF
 Anno di inizio 2014
 Periodo (anno-mese-giorno) 2014-04-01   -   2016-03-31

 Partecipanti

# participant  country  role  EC contrib. [€] 
1    ROYAL HOLLOWAY AND BEDFORD NEW COLLEGE

 Organization address address: EGHAM HILL UNIVERSITY OF LONDON
city: EGHAM
postcode: TW20 0EX

contact info
Titolo: Prof.
Nome: Mark
Cognome: Brown
Email: send email
Telefono: +44 782 584 0858

UK (EGHAM) coordinator 221˙606.40

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 Word cloud

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invasive    colony    evolution    interactions    paper    insect    evolved    social    fire    expression    eusocial    sociality    invasions    insects    underpin    cooperative    levels    cooperation    mechanisms   

 Obiettivo del progetto (Objective)

'Cooperation is a fascinating process that is widespread in nature and which can be used to infer knowledge about basic mechanisms regulating complex behaviours. Cooperation is also a key milestone in the evolution of sociality: cooperative interactions among related individuals underpin the evolution of altruism and division of labour, two traits that have reached their highest expression in insect societies. However, the characterization of the molecular mechanisms underpinning cooperative behaviour has been mainly restricted to highly evolved social organisms that are study models in their field: e.g., the honeybee Apis mellifera, for social insects. In this project I will adopt a novel approach to understand cooperative behaviour in two social insects that have evolved different levels of sociality: the primitively eusocial paper wasp Polistes dominula and the highly eusocial fire ant Solenopsis invicta. To achieve my goal I will adopt a multi-level approach. First, I will focus on two important stages in the life history of social insects, i.e., colony founding and colony maturity. Second, I will use high-throughput RNA sequencing to characterize cooperative behaviour at the genomic level across levels of sociality (the sociogenomic approach). Third, I will investigate how cooperative behaviour is affected by two important ecological factors shared by these two insects: the biology of invasions and host-parasite interactions. Significant evidence suggests that invasive social insects escape from their natural parasites and pathogens and that the expression of cooperative behaviour increases on establishment in the invasive region. Both these factors are likely to be fundamental drivers of the great success shown by social insects in becoming invasive species. With this project I will characterise the sociogenomics of cooperative behaviour across fire ants and paper wasps, and provide valuable insight into the mechanisms that underpin social insect invasions.'

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