Caste differentiation in ants: How a specific hormone regulates the process

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href="https://sciencex.com/help/editorial-team/" target="_blank">Editors</a> have highlighted the following attributes while ensuring the content's credibility: </p> <p> <span class="tick-mark"></span> fact-checked </p> <p> <span class="tick-mark"></span> peer-reviewed publication </p> <p> <span class="tick-mark"></span> trusted source </p> <p> <span class="tick-mark"></span> proofread </p> </div> </div> </div> </div> <h1 class="text-extra-large line-low mb-2">Caste differentiation in ants: How a specific hormone regulates the process</h1> <p class="article-byline text-low"> by <a class="article-byline__link" href="http://www.ku.dk/english/" target="_blank">University of Copenhagen</a> </p> <div class="mt-4 article-main"> <div class="article-gallery lightGallery"> <div data-thumb="https://scx1.b-cdn.net/csz/news/tmb/2024/caste-differentiation-1.jpg" data-src="https://scx2.b-cdn.net/gfx/news/2024/caste-differentiation-1.jpg" data-sub-html="JH as a key regulator for shifting worker development toward a gyne phenotype except for ovaries. Credit: <i>Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences</i> (2024). DOI: 10.1073/pnas.2406999121"> <figure class="article-img"> <img src="https://scx1.b-cdn.net/csz/news/800a/2024/caste-differentiation-1.jpg" alt="Caste differentiation in ants: How a specific hormone regulates phenotypic measurements" title="JH as a key regulator for shifting worker development toward a gyne phenotype except for ovaries. Credit: Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (2024). DOI: 10.1073/pnas.2406999121" width="800" height="530"> <figcaption class="text-darken text-low-up text-truncate-js text-truncate mt-3"> JH as a key regulator for shifting worker development toward a gyne phenotype except for ovaries. Credit: <i>Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences</i> (2024). DOI: 10.1073/pnas.2406999121 </figcaption> </figure> </div> </div><p>Scientists from the University of Copenhagen have revealed how a specific hormone regulates ant caste differentiation by phenotypic measurements of organ-level developmental changes and matching transcriptome analyses. Published in the <i>Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences</i>, the <a href="https://pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.2406999121" target="_blank">study</a> titled "Juvenile hormone as a key regulator for asymmetric caste differentiation in ants" significantly enhances the understanding of caste development and evolution.</p> <div class="article-banner first-banner ads-336x280">  <div id='div-gpt-ad-1449240174198-2'> <script type='text/javascript'> googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('div-gpt-ad-1449240174198-2'); }); </script> </div> </div> <p>Most ants have two morphologically differentiated adult castes—queens and <a href="https://phys.org/tags/workers/" rel="tag" class="textTag">workers</a>—each irreversibly specialized for either reproduction or nonreproductive altruism such as foraging, defense and care of maternal brood. Adult gynes (virgin queens) normally have <a href="https://phys.org/tags/higher+body+mass/" rel="tag" class="textTag">higher body mass</a>, wings and frontal eyes, as well as enlarged ovaries and a sperm storage organ.</p> <p>In contrast, workers are wingless females with smaller body size and degenerated reproductive tracts, usually without a sperm storage organ. In 1910, the American entomologist William Morton Wheeler noted in his monograph Ants that the superorganismal colonies of ants are strikingly analogous to metazoan bodies because queen and workers function as germline and soma at a higher level of bodily organization: the colony-level.</p> <p>We are very used to the idea that germline cells in an animal body are set aside for their special reproductive roles very shortly after an egg is fertilized and starts to develop into an embryo. In most <a href="https://phys.org/tags/social+insects/" rel="tag" class="textTag">social insects</a> with distinct queen (colony germline) and worker (colony soma) castes, the analogous developmental differentiation happens in the <a href="https://phys.org/tags/larval+stage/" rel="tag" class="textTag">larval stage</a> and can still be hormonally reversed.</p> <div class="w-100 mb-4 ads"> <script async src="https://pagead2.googlesyndication.com/pagead/js/adsbygoogle.js?client=ca-pub-0536483524803400" crossorigin="anonymous"></script>  <ins class="adsbygoogle" style="display:block; text-align:center;" data-ad-layout="in-article" data-ad-format="fluid" data-ad-client="ca-pub-0536483524803400" data-ad-slot="8188791252"></ins> <script> (adsbygoogle = window.adsbygoogle || []).push({}); </script> </div> <p>However, in some ant colonies, germlines are also determined earlier, in the embryonic (egg) stage, begging the question whether that makes somatization of workers as irreversible as somatization of animal body cells as development proceeds.</p> <div class="article-gallery lightGallery"> <div data-thumb="https://scx1.b-cdn.net/csz/news/tmb/2024/caste-differentiation.jpg" data-src="https://scx2.b-cdn.net/gfx/news/2024/caste-differentiation.jpg" data-sub-html="An ant colony can be compared to a Metazoan body because of the striking analogy between a fertilized queen mother as germline and the sterile workers as differentiated soma individuals. Credit: Luigi Pontieri"> <figure class="article-img text-center"> <img src="https://scx1.b-cdn.net/csz/news/800a/2024/caste-differentiation.jpg" alt="Caste differentiation in ants" title="An ant colony can be compared to a Metazoan body because of the striking analogy between a fertilized queen mother as germline and the sterile workers as differentiated soma individuals. Credit: Luigi Pontieri"> <figcaption class="text-left text-darken text-truncate text-low-up mt-3"> An ant colony can be compared to a Metazoan body because of the striking analogy between a fertilized queen mother as germline and the sterile workers as differentiated soma individuals. Credit: Luigi Pontieri </figcaption> </figure> </div> </div> <p>The new study from the Department of Biology at the University of Copenhagen finds that caste development is remarkably reversible in pharaoh ants, Monomorium pharaonis, a species where caste determination happens in the eggs stage.</p> <p>"We fed 237 pharaoh ant worker larvae with controlled doses of juvenile hormone (JH) analog during the 3rd larval instar, the final stage of larval development," says Ruyan Li, the lead author of this study.</p> <p>"We found that hormone-treated worker ants developed many gyne-like physical characteristics, such as increased <a href="https://phys.org/tags/body+length/" rel="tag" class="textTag">body length</a>, three extra frontal eyes, wings and flight muscles, gyne-like brains; they even developed the gyne-specific sperm storage organ that workers of this species never have."</p> <p>However, unlike naturally developed gynes, JH-treated workers never developed ovaries, the reproductive organ that ultimately sets gynes apart from workers, showing that the caste-specific JH-sensitivity window does not overlap with the egg-stage. The study also sheds new light on how shifts in developmental-sensitivity for <a href="https://phys.org/tags/growth+hormone/" rel="tag" class="textTag">growth hormone</a> may have played a role in the emergence of new castes in other ants, such as soldiers (modified workers) or permanently wingless gynes.</p> <div class="ads w-100 my-4 article-main__more bg-light p-3 border" aria-hidden="true"> <p class="mb-3"> Discover the latest in science, tech, and space with over <strong>100,000 subscribers</strong> who rely on Phys.org for daily insights. Sign up for our <a href="https://sciencex.com/help/newsletter/" target="_blank">free newsletter</a> and get updates on breakthroughs, innovations, and research that matter—<strong>daily or weekly</strong>. </p> <form action="#" name="nwsubscribe"> <div class="form-row align-items-start"> <div class="offset-lg-1 col-6 col-sm-8 col-lg-7"> <input type="email" name="email" class="form-control" placeholder="e-mail"> </div> <div class="col-sm-4 col-4 col-lg-3"> <input type="hidden" name="project" value="physorg"> <button type="submit" class="btn btn-sm btn-block btn-info">Subscribe</button> </div> </div> </form> </div> <p>"Such novel castes often originate as mosaic phenotypes that recombine gyne- and worker traits, which may become permanent when <a href="https://phys.org/tags/natural+selection/" rel="tag" class="textTag">natural selection</a> rewards a subsequent shift in JH-sensitivity window," says Guojie Zhang, corresponding author of the study and Professor at Zhejiang University in Hangzhou and Adjunct Professor at the University of Copenhagen.</p> <p>"The results confirm the strong analogy between how <a href="https://phys.org/tags/cell+differentiation/" rel="tag" class="textTag">cell differentiation</a> in animal bodies and caste differentiation in ant colonies works. Similar to animal breeders having not yet succeeded in using <a href="https://phys.org/tags/somatic+cells/" rel="tag" class="textTag">somatic cells</a> to produce new animals, this study found similar limitations at the higher level of colonial organization in <a href="https://phys.org/tags/ants/" rel="tag" class="textTag">ants</a>," concludes Professor Koos Boomsma at the University of Copenhagen, a senior co-author of the study.</p> <div class="article-main__more p-4"> <p><strong>More information:</strong> Ruyan Li et al, Juvenile hormone as a key regulator for asymmetric caste differentiation in ants, <i>Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences</i> (2024). <a data-doi="1" href="https://dx.doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2406999121" target="_blank">DOI: 10.1073/pnas.2406999121</a> <div class="mt-3"> <p> <strong>Journal information:</strong> <a href="https://phys.org/journals/proceedings-of-the-national-academy-of-sciences/"><cite>Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences</cite></a> <a class="icon_open" href="http://www.pnas.org/" target="_blank" rel="nofollow"> <svg> <use href="https://phys.b-cdn.net/tmpl/v6/img/svg/sprite.svg#icon_open" x="0" y="0"/> </svg> </a> </p> </div> </div> <div class="d-inline-block text-medium mt-4"> <p> Provided by <a href="https://phys.org/partners/university-of-copenhagen/">University of Copenhagen</a> <a class="icon_open" href="http://www.ku.dk/english/" target="_blank" rel="nofollow"> <svg> <use href="https://phys.b-cdn.net/tmpl/v6/img/svg/sprite.svg#icon_open" x="0" y="0"/> </svg> </a> </p> </div>  <div class="d-none d-print-block"> <div class="mb-4"> <strong>Citation</strong>: Caste differentiation in ants: How a specific hormone regulates the process (2024, November 22) retrieved 17 February 2025 from https://phys.org/news/2024-11-differentiation-ants-specific-hormone.html </div> <div class="border text-muted p-3"> This document is subject to copyright. 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Caste differentiation in ants: How a specific hormone regulates the process