Best be(e) on low fat: linking nutrient perception, regulation and fitness
Please always quote using this URN: urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-208709
- Preventing malnutrition through consuming nutritionally appropriate resources represents a challenge for foraging animals. This is due to often high variation in the nutritional quality of available resources. Foragers consequently need to evaluate different food sources. However, even the same food source can provide a plethora of nutritional and non‐nutritional cues, which could serve for quality assessment. We show that bumblebees, Bombus terrestris , overcome this challenge by relying on lipids as nutritional cue when selecting pollen. ThePreventing malnutrition through consuming nutritionally appropriate resources represents a challenge for foraging animals. This is due to often high variation in the nutritional quality of available resources. Foragers consequently need to evaluate different food sources. However, even the same food source can provide a plethora of nutritional and non‐nutritional cues, which could serve for quality assessment. We show that bumblebees, Bombus terrestris , overcome this challenge by relying on lipids as nutritional cue when selecting pollen. The bees ‘prioritised’ lipid perception in learning experiments and avoided lipid consumption in feeding experiments, which supported survival and reproduction. In contrast, survival and reproduction were severely reduced by increased lipid contents. Our study highlights the importance of fat regulation for pollen foraging bumblebees. It also reveals that nutrient perception, nutrient regulation and reproductive fitness can be linked, which represents an effective strategy enabling quick foraging decisions that prevent malnutrition and maximise fitness.…
Author: | Fabian A. Ruedenauer, David Raubenheimer, Daniela Kessner-Beierlein, Nils Grund-Mueller, Lisa Noack, Johannes Spaethe, Sara D. Leonhardt |
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URN: | urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-208709 |
Document Type: | Journal article |
Faculties: | Fakultät für Biologie / Theodor-Boveri-Institut für Biowissenschaften |
Language: | English |
Parent Title (English): | Ecology Letters |
Year of Completion: | 2020 |
Volume: | 23 |
Issue: | 3 |
Pagenumber: | 545-554 |
Source: | Ecology Letters (2020) 23(3): 545–554. DOI: 10.1111/ele.13454 |
DOI: | https://doi.org/10.1111/ele.13454 |
Dewey Decimal Classification: | 5 Naturwissenschaften und Mathematik / 57 Biowissenschaften; Biologie / 570 Biowissenschaften; Biologie |
Tag: | PER; bee decline; foraging; nutrition; plant-insect interactions; pollen quality; resource use |
Release Date: | 2020/09/22 |
Licence (German): | CC BY-NC: Creative-Commons-Lizenz: Namensnennung, Nicht kommerziell 4.0 International |