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- Title
Ancient tripartite coevolution in the attine ant-microbe symbiosis.
- Authors
Currie, Cameron R; Wong, Bess; Stuart, Alison E; Schultz, Ted R; Rehner, Stephen A; Mueller, Ulrich G; Sung, Gi-Ho; Spatafora, Joseph W; Straus, Neil A
- Abstract
The symbiosis between fungus-growing ants and the fungi they cultivate for food has been shaped by 50 million years of coevolution. Phylogenetic analyses indicate that this long coevolutionary history includes a third symbiont lineage: specialized microfungal parasites of the ants' fungus gardens. At ancient levels, the phylogenies of the three symbionts are perfectly congruent, revealing that the ant-microbe symbiosis is the product of tripartite coevolution between the farming ants, their cultivars, and the garden parasites. At recent phylogenetic levels, coevolution has been punctuated by occasional host-switching by the parasite, thus intensifying continuous coadaptation between symbionts in a tripartite arms race.
- Publication
Science (New York, N.Y.), 2003, Vol 299, Issue 5605, p386
- ISSN
1095-9203
- Publication type
Journal Article
- DOI
10.1126/science.1078155