Social transitions in sponge-dwelling snapping shrimp

Abstract

Sociality is exceedingly rare in the marine environment, with true eusociality found only within a single genus of sponge-dwelling snapping shrimp. This genus is socially diverse and exhibits multiple independent evolutionary origins of both eusociality and communal breeding from pair-forming ancestors. Ecology was critical to the evolution of shrimp sociality, as the transition from host specialization to generalism preceded the evolution of eusociality, and the transition from small to large host sponges favored the evolution of communal breeding. Moreover, a change in life history from planktonic to non-dispersing, crawling larvae only occurred in eusocial species. Here, we present a hypothesis describing the evolutionary transitions toward sociality in shrimp that serves to illustrate how ecology and life history interact to shape social evolution more broadly.