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Male pheromone composition depends on larval but not adult diet in Heliconius melpomene

Kathy Darragh, Kelsey Jaye Ruth Paularena Byers, Richard M Merrill, William O McMillan, Stefan Schulz, Chris D Jiggins
doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/341602
Kathy Darragh
University of Cambridge;
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  • For correspondence: kd350@cam.ac.uk
Kelsey Jaye Ruth Paularena Byers
University of Cambridge;
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Richard M Merrill
Ludwig-Maximilians-Universitat;
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William O McMillan
Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute;
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Stefan Schulz
Technische Universitat Braunschweig
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Chris D Jiggins
University of Cambridge;
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Abstract

Condition-dependent traits can act as honest signals of mate quality, with fitter individuals able to display preferred phenotypes. Nutrition is known to be an important determinant of individual condition, with diet known to affect many secondary sexual traits. In Heliconius butterflies, male chemical signalling plays an important role in female mate choice. Heliconius pheromones are sexually dimorphic, found only in mature males, but it is unclear what information they convey to the female. Here, we manipulate both the larval and adult diet of male Heliconius melpomene rosina to test for environmental effects on wing and genital pheromone production. We find no evidence that adult pollen consumption affects pheromone production in the first ten days after eclosion. We also find strong overlap in the chemical profiles of individuals reared on different larval host plants. However, individual compounds were found in different amounts between host plant treatments. Further electrophysiological and behavioural experiments will be needed to determine the biological significance of these differences.

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The copyright holder for this preprint is the author/funder, who has granted bioRxiv a license to display the preprint in perpetuity. It is made available under a CC-BY 4.0 International license.
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Posted June 07, 2018.
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Male pheromone composition depends on larval but not adult diet in Heliconius melpomene
Kathy Darragh, Kelsey Jaye Ruth Paularena Byers, Richard M Merrill, William O McMillan, Stefan Schulz, Chris D Jiggins
bioRxiv 341602; doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/341602
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Male pheromone composition depends on larval but not adult diet in Heliconius melpomene
Kathy Darragh, Kelsey Jaye Ruth Paularena Byers, Richard M Merrill, William O McMillan, Stefan Schulz, Chris D Jiggins
bioRxiv 341602; doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/341602

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