Intralocus sexual conflict (IASC) occurs when a trait under selection in one sex constrains the other sex from achieving its sex-specific fitness optimum. Selection pressures on body size often differ between the sexes across many species, including humans: among men individuals of average height enjoy the highest reproductive success, while shorter women have the highest reproductive success. ...

BACKGROUND The generalized Trivers-Willard hypothesis (gTWH) proposes that parents who possess any heritable trait which increases male reproductive success at a greater rate than female reproductive success in a given environment will have a higher-than-expected offspring sex ratio, and parents who possess any heritable trait which increases the female reproductive success at a greater rate th...

The genetic basis of division of labor in social insects is a central question in evolutionary and behavioral biology. The honey bee is a model for studying evolutionary behavioral genetics because of its well characterized age-correlated division of labor. After an initial period of within-nest tasks, 2-3 week-old worker bees begin foraging outside the nest. Individuals often specialize by bia...

The generalized Trivers-Willard hypothesis (gTWH) [Kanazawa, S., 2005. Big and tall parents have more sons: further generalizations of the Trivers-Willard hypothesis. J. Theor. Biol. 235, 583-590) proposes that parents who possess any heritable trait which increases the male reproductive success at a greater rate than female reproductive success in a given environment will have a higher-than-ex...

The generalized Trivers-Willard hypothesis proposes that parents who possess any heritable trait that increases male reproductive success at a greater rate than female reproductive success in a given environment will have a higher-than-expected offspring sex ratio (more sons), and parents who possess any heritable trait that increases female reproductive success at a greater rate than male repr...

We analyze a model in which individuals have hereditary reproductive types. The reproductive value of an individual is determined by her reproductive type and the amount of resources she can access. We introduce the possibility of suicide and assume it is also a genetic trait that interacts with the reproductive type of an individual. The main result of the paper is that populations where suici...

Mate choice is considered an important influence in the evolution of mating signals and other sexual traits, and--since divergence in sexual traits causes reproductive isolation--it can be an agent of population divergence. The importance of mate choice in signal evolution can be evaluated by comparing male signal traits with female preference functions, taking into account the shape and streng...

BACKGROUND Honey bees display a complex set of anatomical, physiological, and behavioral traits that correlate with the colony storage of surplus pollen (pollen hoarding). We hypothesize that the association of these traits is a result of pleiotropy in a gene signaling network that was co-opted by natural selection to function in worker division of labor and foraging specialization. By acting o...

There has been much controversy regarding the timing of speciation events in birds, and regarding the relative roles of natural and sexual selection in promoting speciation. Here, we investigate these issues using winter wrens (Troglodytes troglodytes), an unusual example of a passerine with a Holarctic distribution. Geographical variation has led to speculation that the western North American ...

Genetic differentiation and phenotypic plasticity jointly shape intraspecific trait variation, but their roles differ among traits. In short-lived plants, reproductive traits may be more genetically determined due to impact on fitness, whereas vegetative show higher buffer short-term perturbations. Combining a multi-treatment greenhouse experiment with observational field data throughout the ra...