Data from: Social control of reproduction and breeding monopolization in the eusocial snapping shrimp Synalpheus elizabethae

Understanding why individuals within altruistic societies forego reproduction to raise others' offspring has fascinated scientists since Darwin. Although worker polymorphism is thought to have evolved only in sterile workers, worker subcastes appear to be common among social invertebrates and vertebrates. We asked whether sterility accompanies eusociality and morphological differentiation in snapping shrimps (Synalpheus) - the only known marine eusocial group. We show that workers in S. elizabethae are reproductively totipotent, and that female — but not male — gonadal development and mating are mediated by the presence of a queen, apparently without physical aggression. In queenless experimental colonies, a single immature female worker typically became ovigerous, and no female workers matured in colonies with a resident queen. Thus, eusocial shrimp workers retain reproductive totipotency despite signs of morphological specialization. The failure of most female workers to mature is instead facultative and mediated by the presence of the queen, ensuring her reproductive monopoly.自达尔文时代起，探究利他社会中的个体为何放弃自身繁殖以抚育他人后代，便一直是令科学家着迷的研究课题。尽管学界此前认为工体多态性（worker polymorphism）仅演化于不育工体类群，但社会无脊椎动物与脊椎动物中普遍存在工体亚品级。我们以目前已知的唯一海洋真社会性（eusociality）类群——枪虾属（Synalpheus）物种为研究对象，探究真社会性与形态分化是否伴随不育性的产生。本研究证实，伊丽莎白枪虾（S. elizabethae）的工体均具备繁殖全能性（reproductive totipotency）；雌性（而非雄性）的性腺发育与交配行为受社群虾后存在与否的调控，且该调控过程显然未伴随物理攻击行为。在无虾后的实验社群中，通常会有一只未成熟的雌性工体怀卵；而在拥有定居虾后的社群中，无雌性工体能够发育成熟。由此可见，尽管存在形态特化的迹象，真社会性枪虾的工体仍保留繁殖全能性。多数雌性工体无法发育成熟，实为兼性调控的结果，由虾后的存在所介导，以此保障虾后的繁殖垄断地位。