Event Description
Rebeca Rosengaus, PhD, Northeastern University
The Termite Microbiome and its Role in the Evolution of Social
Immunity
Prof. Rosengaus’ research tries to understand the factors that may
have selected for the evolution of termite sociality. She has hypothesized that
pathogens and/or parasites may have played important selection forces that
favored the evolution of complex insect societies.
This evolutionary question is studied by focusing on the
adaptations that termites have evolved in order to resist disease. Termites
nest, feed and forage in microbially-rich environments and their colonies are
composed of thousands of individuals which could easily become infected either
through the direct contact with pathogens or indirectly through the social
interactions among nestmates.
Yet, in spite the high risks of infection, termites thrive within
their nests. What are the means by which these insects cope with disease? What
are the costs and benefits of group-living with respect to disease
susceptibility and disease resistance? Prof. Rosengaus’ research has
established that termites use several, and often simultaneous mechanisms to
reduce the risks of infection, including behavioral, biochemical, immunological
and social adaptations.
This line of work has now expanded to consider the role of
pathogenic microbes on the evolution of both termite mating strategies and
social immunity whereby social interactions facilitate disease resistance at
the colony-level. Additionally, the role of the termites’ microbiome on social
immunity as well as transgenerational immune priming of progeny have also been
a focus of her research.
Given the interdisciplinary nature of her work, which is at the
interface of evolutionary biology, behavioral and chemical ecology, immunology
and genetics, new and more holistic insights into host/pathogen dynamics and
the role these dynamics play in fostering the evolution and maintenance
of insect sociality are possible.
Termites, as well as all other social insects, represent excellent
social test organisms to answer questions about the emerging field of
“socioecoimmunology.” Prof. Rosengaus’ field work takes place at the
Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute in Panama, Brazil and at the Redwoods
in California.
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