10.5061/DRYAD.3Q332
Klepsatel, Peter
University of Veterinary Medicine Vienna
Gáliková, Martina
University of Veterinary Medicine Vienna
De Maio, Nicola
University of Veterinary Medicine Vienna
Ricci, Sara
University of Pisa
Schlötterer, Christian
University of Veterinary Medicine Vienna
Flatt, Thomas
University of Veterinary Medicine Vienna
Data from: Reproductive and post-reproductive life history of wild-caught
Drosophila melanogaster under laboratory conditions
Dryad
dataset
2013
Evolution of ageing
Life History Evolution
trade-offs
Evolutionary physiology
2013-03-13T15:24:31Z
2013-03-13T15:24:31Z
en
https://doi.org/10.1111/jeb.12155
230912 bytes
1
CC0 1.0 Universal (CC0 1.0) Public Domain Dedication
The life history of the fruit fly (Drosophila melanogaster) is well
understood, but fitness components are rarely measured by following single
individuals over their lifetime, thereby limiting insights into lifetime
reproductive success, reproductive senescence and post-reproductive
lifespan. Moreover, most studies have examined long-established laboratory
strains rather than freshly caught individuals and may thus be confounded
by adaptation to laboratory culture, inbreeding or mutation accumulation.
Here, we have followed the life histories of individual females from three
recently caught, non-laboratory-adapted wild populations of D.
melanogaster. Populations varied in a number of life-history traits,
including ovariole number, fecundity, hatchability and lifespan. To
describe individual patterns of age-specific fecundity, we developed a new
model that allowed us to distinguish four phases during a female's
life: a phase of reproductive maturation, followed by a period of linear
and then exponential decline in fecundity and, finally, a post-ovipository
period. Individual females exhibited clear-cut fecundity peaks, which
contrasts with previous analyses, and post-peak levels of fecundity
declined independently of how long females lived. Notably, females had a
pronounced post-reproductive lifespan, which on average made up 40% of
total lifespan. Post-reproductive lifespan did not differ among
populations and was not correlated with reproductive fitness components,
supporting the hypothesis that this period is a highly variable, random
‘add-on’ at the end of reproductive life rather than a correlate of
selection on reproductive fitness. Most life-history traits were
positively correlated, a pattern that might be due to genotype by
environment interactions when wild flies are brought into a novel
laboratory environment but that is unlikely explained by inbreeding or
positive mutational covariance caused by mutation accumulation.
Raw Data Klepsatel et alWe followed the life histories of a large number
of individual females, derived from three recently caught, geographically
distinct wild populations from Austria, Zambia and South Africa over their
lifetime. We measured ovariole number, fecundity (daily number of eggs),
hatchability (of the offspring of the experimental females) as a function
of maternal age, and lifespan (age at death) of experimental females under
optimal laboratory conditions. Here we present the demographic raw data
for these traits/measurements; each line represents an individual female
fly. Fom these raw data, we then estimated individual lifetime fecundity,
total lifetime production of viable eggs, and the length of the
reproductive and post-reproductive period (these estimates are not shown
here but can be found in our publication). For details see our paper,
Klepsatel et al. (2013) in Journal of Evolutionary Biology. For
additional, more specific (sub-)datasets based on the raw data presented
here (e.g., data for survival analysis based on the distribution of age at
death), which we have used for particular statistical analyses, or for
statistical analyses outputs please contact the corresponding author,
Thomas Flatt at thomas.flatt@unil.ch
Austria
South Africa
Zambia