Kleptoparasites of social spider colonies do not track hosts' subdivided population structure
Bibliographic record
Abstract
Organisms with lower dispersal abilities tend to have more genetically dissimilar populations. The same is true for parasites, whose transmission frequency may depend on the population structure of the host. This should be especially true when hosts and parasites face similar barriers to dispersal. Here, we considered the similarities between host and parasite population structure in a social spider system. In this system, host colonies are typified by rapid growth via internal recruitment followed by budding or fission events when colonies grow too large, with each colony representing a distinct population. Host colonies provide habitat for kleptoparasitic spiders, which steal prey from and may also feed directly on host individuals. We asked whether kleptoparasites exhibit a similar degree of population subdivision as their host. Under the free-mixing hypothesis (i.e., horizontal transmission), kleptoparasites would have well-mixed populations across broader regions than a single host nest, whereas host populations would be strongly genetically structured. Under the host-tracking hypothesis (i.e., vertical transmission), kleptoparasites would have a population structure that parallels that of the host. We conducted a genotype-by-sequencing study to assess the population structure of both hosts and kleptoparasites within three nearby regions in eastern Ecuador. We found strong signatures of population differentiation and bottlenecks in the host species, which is congruent with past studies. However, we found that kleptoparasite populations were well mixed across host nests, with no evidence of recent bottlenecks. These results support our free-mixing hypothesis, suggesting that kleptoparasites follow patterns of horizontal transmission in this social spider system.
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How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame machine prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.
Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.000 | 0.002 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.001 | 0.000 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Open science | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Research integrity | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.001 | 0.000 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".