Chemical fingerprints encode mother-offspring similarity, colony membership, relatedness, and genetic quality in fur seals.
Chemical communication underpins virtually all aspects of vertebrate social life, yet remains poorly understood because of its highly complex mechanistic basis. We therefore used chemical fingerprinting of skin swabs and genetic analysis to explore the chemical cues that may underlie mother-offspring recognition in colonially breeding Antarctic fur seals. By sampling mother-offspring pairs from two different colonies, using a variety of statistical approaches and genotyping a large panel of microsatellite loci, we show that colony membership, mother-offspring similarity, heterozygosity, and genetic relatedness are all chemically encoded. Moreover, chemical similarity between mothers and offspring reflects a combination of genetic and environmental influences, the former partly encoded by substances resembling known pheromones. Our findings reveal the diversity of information contained within chemical fingerprints and have implications for understanding mother-offspring communication, kin recognition, and mate choice.
Department of Animal Behaviour, Bielefeld University, 33501 Bielefeld, Germany; School of Natural Sciences and Psychology, Faculty of Science, Liverpool John Moores University, Liverpool L3 3AF, United Kingdom;
Martin A
MA
Stoffel
Arbeitsgruppe Olfactory Communication, Department of Animal Behaviour, Bielefeld University, 33501 Bielefeld, Germany; j_i_hoffman@hotmail.com barbara.caspers@uni-bielefeld.de.
Barbara A
BA
Caspers
British Antarctic Survey, Natural Environment Research Council, High Cross, Cambridge, CB3 OET, United Kingdom;
Jaume
http://orcid.org/0000-0002-2115-0150
J
Forcada
Department of Animal Behaviour, Bielefeld University, 33501 Bielefeld, Germany;
Athina
A
Giannakara
Department of Chemical Ecology, Bielefeld University, 33501 Bielefeld, Germany.
Markus
M
Baier
Department of Animal Behaviour, Bielefeld University, 33501 Bielefeld, Germany;
Luke
L
Eberhart-Phillips
Department of Chemical Ecology, Bielefeld University, 33501 Bielefeld, Germany.
Caroline
C
Müller
Department of Animal Behaviour, Bielefeld University, 33501 Bielefeld, Germany; j_i_hoffman@hotmail.com barbara.caspers@uni-bielefeld.de.
Joseph I
JI
Hoffman
D000819:Animal Communication; D000818:Animals; D000864:Antarctic Regions; D001499:Bayes Theorem; D003463:Cues; D004777:Environment; D046069:Fur Seals / Q000235:genetics*; D008401:Gas Chromatography-Mass Spectrometry; D014644:Genetic Variation; D005828:Genetics, Population; D005838:Genotype; D005843:Geography; D018895:Microsatellite Repeats / Q000235:genetics*; D010675:Pheromones / Q000737:chemistry; D021641:Recognition, Psychology; D012867:Skin / Q000737:chemistry*
D010675:Pheromones
GC-MS; chemical communication; genotype; mother–offspring recognition; pinniped