Student 10-Minute Presentation
Systematics, Evolution, and Biodiversity
Student
Meghan Elysse Moore
Ph.D. Student
University of California
Riverside, California
Erica Sarro
University of California
El Segundo, California
Guy Bloch
Hebrew University of Jerusalem
Jerusalem, Yerushalayim, Israel
Kerry Elizabeth Mauck
Assistant Proffesor
University of California
Riverside, California
Animals that live in close proximity can exhibit social regulation, where social cues influence the development, behavior, and physiology of group members. Research on social regulation in eusocial insects has focused heavily on how it is mediated through pheromones. In socially mediated reproduction, pheromones play a prominent role in queen-mediated inhibition of egg laying by workers. Previous research has focused heavily on how queens mediate offspring, however, little work has explored how workers socially regulate queens. Here, we examined the reverse scenario: how queen reproduction is regulated by workers. For this work, we focused on bumble bees, which are a eusocial lineage wherein queens initiate nests solitarily before transitioning to eusociality with the emergence of the first workers in the nest. We developed a series of factorial cue exposure experiments that included the use of an automated system to directly deliver a tactile stimulus to queens. This automated system was created to reflect the frequency at which queens interact with their first cohort of workers. Our work provides evidence that the acceleration of egg laying in nest-founding queens is largely driven by a tactile cue from social group members. Additionally, our study adds to a growing body of evidence that tactile cues have underappreciated roles in mediating social regulation within insect societies.