Mafia Hypothesis
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Mafia Hypothesis
The mafia hypothesis is an explanation of why nesting host species do not reject the eggs of brood parasites. The parasite eggs are accepted by the host to avoid retaliation (egg destruction, nest destruction, and/or the killing of nestlings) by the brood parasite, in an example of coevolution. Amotz Zahavi proposed it in 1979, and it was tested by Manuel Soler in 1995. Mathematical modeling Maria Abou Chakra, of the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Biology, with others, successfully mathematically modeled the mafia hypothesis as a viable strategy, conditional on two factors: * hosts are capable of learning * parasites revisit nests They found that the proportion of mafia versus non-mafia brood parasites, and unconditionally versus conditionally accepting hosts cycled over time. If all hosts unconditionally accepted parasite eggs, then it would not be worth the parasite's effort to revisit the nest to conduct a mafia retaliation. If sufficiently few parasites were mafi ...
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Brood Parasite
Brood may refer to: Nature * Brood, a collective term for offspring * Brooding, the incubation of bird eggs by their parents * Bee brood, the young of a beehive * Individual broods of North American periodical cicadas: ** Brood X, the largest brood, which emerges on a 17-year cycle ** Brood XIII, a brood centered on Northern Illinois and its surrounding area, which also emerges on a 17-year cycle ** Brood XIX, a large brood in the Southern United States which emerges on a 13-year cycle People with the surname * Herman Brood (1946–2001), Dutch musician, painter, actor, poet and media personality * Philippe Brood (1964–2000), Dutch politician Entertainment * '' The Brood'', a 1979 horror film directed by David Cronenberg * Brood (comics), an alien species from the Marvel Comics universe * The Brood (professional wrestling) The Brood was a List of professional wrestling terms#Stable, stable known for its time in the WWE, World Wrestling Federation (WWF, now WWE) duri ...
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Host (biology)
In biology and medicine, a host is a larger organism that harbours a smaller organism; whether a parasite, parasitic, a mutualism (biology), mutualistic, or a commensalism, commensalist ''guest'' (symbiont). The guest is typically provided with nourishment and shelter. Examples include animals playing host to parasitic worms (e.g. nematodes), cell (biology), cells harbouring pathogenic (disease-causing) viruses, or a Fabaceae, bean plant hosting mutualistic (helpful) Rhizobia, nitrogen-fixing bacteria. More specifically in botany, a host plant supplies nutrient, food resources to micropredators, which have an evolutionarily stable strategy, evolutionarily stable relationship with their hosts similar to ectoparasitism. The host range is the collection of hosts that an organism can use as a partner. Symbiosis Symbiosis spans a wide variety of possible relationships between organisms, differing in their permanence and their effects on the two parties. If one of the partners in an ...
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Coevolution
In biology, coevolution occurs when two or more species reciprocally affect each other's evolution through the process of natural selection. The term sometimes is used for two traits in the same species affecting each other's evolution, as well as gene-culture coevolution. Charles Darwin mentioned evolutionary interactions between flowering plants and insects in ''On the Origin of Species'' (1859). Although he did not use the word coevolution, he suggested how plants and insects could evolve through reciprocal evolutionary changes. Naturalists in the late 1800s studied other examples of how interactions among species could result in reciprocal evolutionary change. Beginning in the 1940s, plant pathologists developed breeding programs that were examples of human-induced coevolution. Development of new crop plant varieties that were resistant to some diseases favored rapid evolution in pathogen populations to overcome those plant defenses. That, in turn, required the development of ...
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Amotz Zahavi
Amotz Zahavi (; August 14, 1928 – May 12, 2017) was an Israeli evolutionary biologist, a Professor in the Department of Zoology at Tel Aviv University, and one of the founders of the Society for the Protection of Nature in Israel. His main work concerned the evolution of signals, particularly those signals that are indicative of fitness, and their selection for "honesty". Biography Amotz Zahavi was influenced to study zoology by the director of the zoo at Tel Aviv, Heinrich Mendelssohn. He received his Ph.D. from Tel Aviv University in 1970. He was married to Avishag Zahavi, a biologist and a co-investigator. He died in Tel Aviv, Israel on May 12, 2017, aged 88. Scientific career Zahavi is best known for his work on the handicap principle, which explains the evolution of characteristics, behaviors or structures that appear contrary to the principles of Darwinian evolution in that they appear to reduce fitness and endanger individual organisms. Evolved by sexual selection, ...
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Max Planck Institute For Evolutionary Biology
The Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Biology is a German institute for evolutionary biology. It is located in Plön, Schleswig-Holstein, Germany. History The institute was founded by German zoologist Otto Zacharias as ''Hydrobiologische Station zu Plön''. Working in Italy in the 1880s, Zacharias was inspired by the highly recognised Stazione Zoologica in Naples, founded in 1870 by Anton Dohrn, to set up the first biological station for freshwater research in Germany. He secured financial support from the Prussian government and several private individuals to establish it on Großer Plöner See in 1891, as a private research institute. As the director, Zacharias published research reports from 1893 on the Station's activities, which were recorded from 1905 in the Archives of Hydrobiology. In so-called "summer schools" Zacharias trained teachers and laity interested in working with the microscope. It became part of the Max Planck Society in 1948, and was renamed in 1966 as ...
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