Titre
The expression and impact of antifungal grooming in ants.
Type
article
Institution
UNIL/CHUV/Unisanté + institutions partenaires
Périodique
Auteur(s)
Reber, A.
Auteure/Auteur
Purcell, J.
Auteure/Auteur
Buechel, S.D.
Auteure/Auteur
Buri, P.
Auteure/Auteur
Chapuisat, M.
Auteure/Auteur
Liens vers les personnes
Liens vers les unités
ISSN
1420-9101
Statut éditorial
Publié
Date de publication
2011
Volume
24
Numéro
5
Première page
954
Dernière page/numéro d’article
964
Peer-reviewed
Oui
Langue
anglais
Résumé
Parasites can cause extensive damage to animal societies in which many related individuals frequently interact. In response, social animals have evolved diverse individual and collective defences. Here, we measured the expression and efficiency of self-grooming and allo-grooming when workers of the ant Formica selysi were contaminated with spores of the fungal entomopathogen Metarhizium anisopliae. The amount of self-grooming increased in the presence of fungal spores, which shows that the ants are able to detect the risk of infection. In contrast, the amount of allo-grooming did not depend on fungal contamination. Workers groomed all nestmate workers that were re-introduced into their groups. The amount of allo-grooming towards noncontaminated individuals was higher when the group had been previously exposed to the pathogen. Allo-grooming decreased the number of fungal spores on the surface of contaminated workers, but did not prevent infection in the conditions tested (high dose of spores and late allo-grooming). The rate of disease transmission to groomers and other nestmates was extremely low. The systematic allo-grooming of all individuals returning to the colony, be they contaminated or not, is probably a simple but robust prophylactic defence preventing the spread of fungal diseases in insect societies.
PID Serval
serval:BIB_708264A6CF88
PMID
Open Access
Oui
Date de création
2010-12-20T16:40:26.708Z
Date de création dans IRIS
2025-05-20T23:00:08Z
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Nom
BIB_708264A6CF88.P001.pdf
Version du manuscrit
published
Taille
339.97 KB
Format
Adobe PDF
PID Serval
serval:BIB_708264A6CF88.P001
URN
urn:nbn:ch:serval-BIB_708264A6CF885
Somme de contrôle
(MD5):75a05702275f96debd597a34ea95fcea