Ancient Tripartite Coevolution in the Attine Ant-Microbe Symbiosis Journal Articles uri icon

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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.

authors

  • Currie, Cameron
  • Wong, Bess
  • Stuart, Alison E
  • Schultz, Ted R
  • Rehner, Stephen A
  • Mueller, Ulrich G
  • Sung, Gi-Ho
  • Spatafora, Joseph W
  • Straus, Neil A

publication date

  • January 17, 2003