Beyond Royalactin and a Master Inducer Explanation of Phenotypic Plasticity in Honey Bees

Overview

Journal Commun Biol

Specialty Biology

Date 2018 Oct 2

PMID 30271895

Citations 14

Authors

Ryszard Maleszka

Affiliations

Soon will be listed here.

Abstract

Distinct female castes produced from one genotype are the trademark of a successful evolutionary invention in eusocial insects known as reproductive division of labour. In honey bees, fertile queens develop from larvae fed a complex diet called royal jelly. Recently, one protein in royal jelly, dubbed Royalactin, was deemed to be the exclusive driver of queen bee determination. However, this notion has not been universally accepted. Here I critically evaluate this line of research and argue that the sheer complexity of creating alternate phenotypes from one genotype cannot be reduced to a single dietary component. An acceptable model of environmentally driven caste differentiation should include the facets of dynamic thinking, such as the concepts of attractor states and genetic hierarchical networks.

Citing Articles

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