Symbiotic Communities in Fungus-Growing Ants

Vocabulary flashcards covering symbiotic interactions, host-pathogen dynamics, and behavioral defenses in fungus-growing ants based on lecture material.

Attine

Fungus-growing ants that serve as an important model for the study of cooperation and conflict over the last 100 years.

Trachymyrmex septentrionalis

The northern-most species of fungus-growing ants, used by the Klassen lab as a model system, with small colonies of ~1000 workers and fungal habitats located 20-30cm underground.

Atta (Leaf-cutter ants)

The most highly evolved fungus-growing ants, possessing millions of colony members and serving as dominant herbivores in neo-tropical forests.

Clonal propagation

The process in a fungus-growing ant colony's life cycle where a new fertilized queen takes a small piece of fungus to create a new colony, allowing co-specialization, behavioral adaptation, and disease management.

Escovopsis

A specific pathogen of the garden fungus not found anywhere else, present in up to 50% of gardens, which produces Shearinines that inhibit ant movement.

Shearinines

Molecules produced in the structure of Escovopsis that inhibit ant movement.

Metapleural gland

A gland in ants that produces antimicrobial secretions as part of their chemical defense.

Dumps (in ant colonies)

Separate chambers where waste, old, and diseased biomass are transferred from the fungal garden as part of antiseptic behavior.

Fungus-fungus antagonism

An interaction between fungal partners where antagonism increases with increasing genetic distance.

Secondary metabolites

Molecules used by microbes to interact with each other and their hosts while maximizing their own self-interest.