The Role of Dopamine in the Collective Regulation of Foraging in Harvester Ants

Daniel A Friedman; Anna Pilko; Dorota Skowronska-Krawczyk; Karolina Krasinska; Jacqueline W Parker; Jay Hirsh; Deborah M Gordon

doi:10.1016/j.isci.2018.09.001

The Role of Dopamine in the Collective Regulation of Foraging in Harvester Ants

iScience. 2018 Oct 26:8:283-294. doi: 10.1016/j.isci.2018.09.001. Epub 2018 Sep 27.

Authors

Daniel A Friedman¹, Anna Pilko², Dorota Skowronska-Krawczyk³, Karolina Krasinska⁴, Jacqueline W Parker⁵, Jay Hirsh⁵, Deborah M Gordon⁶

Affiliations

¹ Department of Biology, Stanford University, Stanford, CA 94305, USA. Electronic address: dfri@stanford.edu.
² Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry and the Institute for Quantitative and Computational Biosciences (QCB), University of California, Los Angeles, Los Angeles, CA 90095, USA.
³ Shiley Eye Institute, Richard C. Atkinson Lab for Regenerative Ophthalmology, Department of Ophthalmology, University of California, San Diego, La Jolla, CA 92093, USA.
⁴ Stanford University Mass Spectrometry, Stanford University, Stanford, CA 94305, USA.
⁵ Department of Biology, University of Virginia, Charlottesville, Charlottesville, VA 22904, USA.
⁶ Department of Biology, Stanford University, Stanford, CA 94305, USA.

Abstract

Colonies of the red harvester ant (Pogonomyrmex barbatus) differ in how they regulate collective foraging activity in response to changes in humidity. We used transcriptomic, physiological, and pharmacological experiments to investigate the molecular basis of this ecologically important variation in collective behavior among colonies. RNA sequencing of forager brain tissue showed an association between colony foraging activity and differential expression of transcripts related to biogenic amine and neurohormonal metabolism and signaling. In field experiments, pharmacological increases in forager brain dopamine titer caused significant increases in foraging activity. Colonies that were naturally most sensitive to humidity were significantly more responsive to the stimulatory effect of exogenous dopamine. In addition, forager brain tissue significantly varied among colonies in biogenic amine content. Neurophysiological variation among colonies associated with individual forager sensitivity to humidity may reflect the heritable molecular variation on which natural selection acts to shape the collective regulation of foraging.

Keywords: Entomology; Molecular Neuroscience; Neuroscience.

Grants and funding

R01 GM084128/GM/NIGMS NIH HHS/United States