Major evolutionary transitions in ant agriculture

Agriculture is a specialized form of symbiosis that is known to have evolved in only four animal groups: humans, bark beetles, termites, and ants. Here, we reconstruct the major evolutionary transitions that produced the five distinct agricultural systems of the fungus-growing ants, the most well studied of the nonhuman agriculturalists. We do so with reference to the first fossil-calibrated, multiple-gene, molecular phylogeny that incorporates the full range of taxonomic diversity within the fungus-growing ant tribe Attini. Our analyses indicate that the original form of ant agriculture, the cultivation of a diverse subset of fungal species in the tribe Leucocoprineae, evolved approximately 50 million years…

• NS
  National Science Foundation

  Awards: 0110073, 0431330
• SI
  Smithsonian Institution
• NG
  National Geographic Society
• HU
  Harvard University
• HY
  Helsingin Yliopisto
• DO
  Division of Environmental Biology