The tangled bank of sexual selection: how the different processes of sexual selection shape evolution in tropical bugs

This project will explore how different processes of sexual selection interact to shape evolution in species of tropical true bug.

It is now clear that sexual selection cannot simply be broken down into male-male competition and female choice. Instead, we now know that both males and females are likely to be choosy to some extent, and that females may also compete over access to high quality males, even in species where the two sexes appear to have “traditional” sex roles.

Moreover, it is also clear that male and female mating decisions do not coincide, leading to various forms of sexual conflict over mating, including coercive matings and cryptic patterns of mate choice. And when we consider that pre-copulatory and post-copulatory processes of sexual selection may act in different directions, we now know that we need to take a more holistic view of how sexual selection acts in any given species.

This project will explore how different processes of sexual selection shape male and female phenotypic evolution in tropical leaf-footed bugs in the family Coreidae, focusing in particular on the heliconia bug, Leptoscelis tricolor. There has been a growing interest in studying sexual selection in the tropics (Macedo and Machado, 2013), as it is clear that life-history evolution can be very different in the tropics compared to more temperate regions where, for historical reasons, much of the early empirical work on sexual selection has been carried out. This means that the interaction between natural and sexual selection, and indeed between different processes of sexual selection, may play out differently in tropical species, and so we badly need studies that change our taxonomic and regional biases in terms of model species.

The successful applicant will use a mixture of field experiments in Panama, and laboratory analyses in St Andrews, to tease apart how sexual selection, sexual conflict, and life history evolution shape phenotypic evolution. The project will provide a number of key training opportunities: (1) training in experimental design and behavioural techniques, in both the field and the laboratory; (2) undertaking field-work in often challenging tropical conditions; (3) quantitative skills, from data management through to statistical analysis; (4) communication skills, in terms of presenting work to both academic and non-technical audiences through a variety of media. There may also be opportunities for the use of molecular techniques to explore patterns of paternity, to develop meta-analytical tests of sexual selection theory, or to develop and test new theory, depending on the interests of the student.

This project will be a collaboration between Dr David Shuker (University of St Andrews), Dr Christine Miller (University of Florida), and Dr Ummat Somjee (STRI). For further details of the work in the Insect Behavioural Ecology lab, please visit our website: http://insects.st-andrews.ac.uk. You are strongly encouraged to make informal enquiries before applying, so please also email Dr David Shuker at: [Email Address Removed].