2009-04-24

Ant Reproduces Without Sex

Clipped from: PHOTO IN THE NEWS: All-Female Ant Species Found
National Geographic

PHOTO IN THE NEWS: All-Female Ant Species Found





April 17, 2009—Save the males? Too late for Mycocepurus smithii (pictured). This leaf-cutter ant species is all female and thrives without sex of any kind—ever—according to a new study. The ants have evolved to reproduce only when queens clone themselves.
Clipped from: BBC NEWS | Science & Environment | Ants inhabit 'world without sex'

British Broadcasting Corporation

Ants inhabit 'world without sex'


An Amazonian ant has dispensed with sex and developed into an all-female species, researchers have found.

The ants reproduce via cloning - the queen ants copy themselves to produce genetically identical daughters.

[...]

Anna Himler, the biologist from the University of Arizona who led the research, told BBC News that the team used a battery of tests to verify their findings.

[...]

There are advantages to life without sex, Dr Himler explained.

"It avoids the energetic cost of producing males, and doubles the number of reproductive females produced each generation from 50% to 100% of the offspring."



Clipped from: Mycocepurus smithii - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Mycocepurus smithii

Mycocepurus smithii is an attini fungus-growing ant from Latin America whose species consists exclusively of females which reproduce asexually. The queen reproduces by parthenogenesis and all ants in a colony are female clones of the queen.[1] The ants cultivate a garden of fungus inside their colony grown with pieces of dead vegetables and other insects. It is this capacity for farming which initially prompted research into the species as a basal genus member would provide insight into the natural history of the fungal-cultivating ant tribe, Attini.[2]


Himler research

The research team was led by a graduate student at the University of Texas at Austin in the United States, Anna Himler.[1][5] The researchers initially were interested in the ants' capability for cultivating fungus.[5] The researchers used DNA profiling to confirm that each member of the colony was genetically identical to the queen.[5] They also discovered through a process of dissection that the mussel organ, a female docking apparatus within the vagina used to hook the mate's genitalia,[6] had degenerated in members of this species.[7] A total of six separate tests were carried out, with the researchers unable to locate any male members of the species.[1] The team's findings were then published in the journal Proceedings of the Royal Society B.[7]



Clipped from: Mycocepurus smithii (Forel, 1893) - Encyclopedia of Life








Sources:
  1. PHOTO IN THE NEWS: All-Female Ant Species Found
  2. Mycocepurus smithii - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
  3. BBC NEWS | Science & Environment | Ants inhabit 'world without sex'
  4. Mycocepurus smithii (Forel, 1893) - Encyclopedia of Life
Related:
  1. Females get along fine without males - in the world of tropical ants - Telegraph
  2. Machado Lab