Miss Patricia Slattery1, Ass. Prof. Michael P. Schwarz, Prof. Michael S.Y. Lee2, Dr. Ben A. Parslow2, Dr. Bruno Alves Buzatto1

1College of Science and Engineering, Flinders University, Adelaide, Australia, 2Biological and Earth Sciences, South Australian Museum, Adelaide, Australia

Biography:

I am a native bee researcher, interested in applying a myriad of methodologies and fields to answer questions about our Australian bee fauna. I have a particular interest in Euryglossinae, a hyperdiverse, endemic subfamily that is a major part of my PhD thesis. I have previously worked on the floral host breadth of several families of Australian bees in my Masters, and the historical demography of Fijian halicids across an elevational gradient in my honours.

In my (somewhat limited) spare time I am the Director of Student Affairs for the Australian Entomological Society and a part of the permanent Conference Committee. I am also a demonstrator in a range of topics for undergraduates, everything from first-year biology to genetics and animal behaviour.

Perhaps most importantly, I just really like arthropods.

Abstract:

The bee genus Lasioglossum is both diverse and widespread in Australia, with many species ground-nesting in communal aggregations with egalitarian social structures. This social structure is common in our Australian halictids, but not outside of them, and in some species coincides with the exhibition of male dimorphism. There is a more typical winged phenotype, that mates in the usual pattern with females on a flower outside of the nest. The alternate male phenotypes are flightless, macrocephalic, mate with females in the nest, and fight other males to the death.

Inbreeding in haplodiploids can have more immediately severe consequences, producing sterile males that result in and exacerbate an extinction vortex. However, insects are often regarded as incapable of ‘true’ kin recognition, and any avoidance behaviours are attributed to the familiarity of individuals. But this familiarity model doesn’t fit well when applied to an egalitarian society of communal nesters. Flightless, macrocephalic males are largely restricted to the nest so what behaviours can they demonstrate to avoid inbreeding? We address this question by determining if (i) macrocephalic males avoid killing their brothers (to avoid negative inclusive fitness), and (ii) they avoid mating with their sisters (which results in sterile diploid males in the brood). If macrocephalic males avoid related males and mating with sisters, but not unrelated female nestmates, this could explain the surprisingly low relatedness in egalitarian systems and help oppose the familiarity model.