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Diet-based assortative mating through sexual imprinting.

ABSTRACT: Speciation is facilitated by "magic traits," where divergent natural selection on such traits also results in assortative mating. In animal populations, diet has the potential to act as a magic trait if populations diverge in consumed food that incidentally affects mating and therefore sexual isolation. While diet-based assortative mating has been observed in the laboratory and in natural populations, the mechanisms causing positive diet-based assortment remain largely unknown. Here, we experimentally created divergent diets in a sexually imprinting species of mouse, Peromyscus gossypinus (the cotton mouse), to test the hypothesis that sexual imprinting on diet could be a mechanism that generates rapid and significant sexual isolation. We provided breeding pairs with novel garlic- or orange-flavored water and assessed whether their offspring, exposed to these flavors in utero and in the nest before weaning, later preferred mates that consumed the same flavored water as their parents. While males showed no preference, females preferred males of their parental diet, which is predicted to yield moderate sexual isolation. Thus, our experiment demonstrates the potential for sexual imprinting on dietary cues learned in utero and/or postnatally to facilitate reproductive isolation and potentially speciation.

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This article has earned an Open Data Badge for making publicly available the digitally-shareable data necessary to reproduce the reported results. The data is available at https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.n1qq6v3.

SUBMITTER: Delaney EK

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6854104 | biostudies-literature | 2019 Nov

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Diet-based assortative mating through sexual imprinting.

Delaney Emily K EK Hoekstra Hopi E HE

Ecology and evolution 20190930 21

Speciation is facilitated by "magic traits," where divergent natural selection on such traits also results in assortative mating. In animal populations, diet has the potential to act as a magic trait if populations diverge in consumed food that incidentally affects mating and therefore sexual isolation. While diet-based assortative mating has been observed in the laboratory and in natural populations, the mechanisms causing positive diet-based assortment remain largely unknown. Here, we experime ...[more]

PMID: 31844516

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Project description:BackgroundSex pheromone communication systems may be a major force driving moth speciation by causing behavioral reproductive isolation via assortative meeting of conspecific individuals. The 'E' and 'Z' pheromone races of the European corn borer (ECB) are a textbook example in this respect. 'Z' females produce and 'Z' males preferentially respond to a 'Z' pheromone blend, while the 'E' race communicates via an 'E' blend. Both races do not freely hybridize in nature and their populations are genetically differentiated. A straightforward explanation would be that their reproductive isolation is a mere consequence of "assortative meeting" resulting from their different pheromones specifically attracting males towards same-race females at long range. However, previous laboratory experiments and those performed here show that even when moths are paired in a small box - i.e., when the meeting between sexual partners is forced - inter-race couples still have a lower mating success than intra-race ones. Hence, either the difference in attractivity of E vs. Z pheromones for males of either race still holds at short distance or the reproductive isolation between E and Z moths may not only be favoured by assortative meeting, but must also result from an additional mechanism ensuring significant assortative mating at close range. Here, we test whether this close-range mechanism is linked to the E/Z female sex pheromone communication system.Methodology/principal findingsUsing crosses and backcrosses of E and Z strains, we found no difference in mating success between full-sisters emitting different sex pheromones. Conversely, the mating success of females with identical pheromone types but different coefficients of relatedness to the two parental strains was significantly different, and was higher when their genetic background was closer to that of their male partner's pheromone race.Conclusions/significanceWe conclude that the close-range mechanism ensuring assortative mating between the E and Z ECB pheromone races is unrelated to the difference in female sex pheromone. Although the nature of this mechanism remains elusive, our results show that it is expressed in females, acts at close range, segregates independently of the autosome carrying Pher and of both sex chromosomes, and is widely distributed since it occurs both in France and in the USA.

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Diet-based assortative mating through sexual imprinting.

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Diet-based assortative mating through sexual imprinting.

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