Climate-mediated cooperation promotes niche expansion in burying beetles.
The ability to form cooperative societies may explain why humans and social insects have come to dominate the earth. Here we examine the ecological consequences of cooperation by quantifying the fitness of cooperative (large groups) and non-cooperative (small groups) phenotypes in burying beetles (Nicrophorus nepalensis) along an elevational and temperature gradient. We experimentally created large and small groups along the gradient and manipulated interspecific competition with flies by heating carcasses. We show that cooperative groups performed as thermal generalists with similarly high breeding success at all temperatures and elevations, whereas non-cooperative groups performed as thermal specialists with higher breeding success only at intermediate temperatures and elevations. Studying the ecological consequences of cooperation may not only help us to understand why so many species of social insects have conquered the earth, but also to determine how climate change will affect the success of these and other social species, including our own.DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.7554/eLife.02440.001.
Biodiversity Research Center, Academia Sinica, Taipei, Taiwan Department of Entomology, National Taiwan University, Taipei, Taiwan.
Syuan-Jyun
SJ
Sun
Department of Ecology, Evolution and Environmental Biology, Columbia University, New York, United States.
Dustin R
DR
Rubenstein
Biodiversity Research Center, Academia Sinica, Taipei, Taiwan.
Bo-Fei
BF
Chen
Biodiversity Research Center, Academia Sinica, Taipei, Taiwan.
Shih-Fan
SF
Chan
Biodiversity Research Center, Academia Sinica, Taipei, Taiwan.
Jian-Nan
JN
Liu
Biodiversity Research Center, Academia Sinica, Taipei, Taiwan.
Mark
M
Liu
Department of Ecoscience and Ecotechnology, National University of Tainan, Tainan, Taiwan.
Wenbe
W
Hwang
Department of Entomology, National Taiwan University, Taipei, Taiwan.
Ping-Shih
PS
Yang
Biodiversity Research Center, Academia Sinica, Taipei, Taiwan shensf@sinica.edu.tw.
Sheng-Feng
SF
Shen
D000818:Animals; D057231:Climate Change; D001517:Coleoptera / Q000378:metabolism* / Q000502:physiology*; D003163:Competitive Behavior; D003299:Cooperative Behavior; D004777:Environment; D016014:Linear Models; D015999:Multivariate Analysis; D012098:Reproduction; D012919:Social Behavior; D013624:Taiwan; D013696:Temperature
burying beetles; generalist-specialist; grouping benefit; social conflict; social conquest