Nutrition affects larval survival and the development of morphological traits in male and female flour beetles, but genital size and shape remain canalized

House, Clarissa 1 ; Rapkin, James2 ; Janicot Bale, Mathilda2 ; Hunt, John1 ; Hosken, David2

Research facility: Western Sydney University

Published Jul 25, 2024; Updated Sep 12, 2024 on Dryad. https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.z8w9ghxmb

Abstract

The caloric content and macronutrient ratio of the diet consumed is a major source of phenotypic variation in most animal populations. While these nutritional effects have been well-documented for a variety of life-history and morphological traits, the effects of nutrition on male genitals are poorly understood but genitals are thought to be more canalised than general morphology and hence less susceptible to variation in nutrition. Even less is known about the effects of nutrition on female genital form, which to our knowledge, have never been investigated. Here we tested for the effects of juvenile dietary macronutrients (protein and carbohydrate) on larval survival, and adult morphology, including genital size and shape in male and female flour beetles (Tribolium castaneum). We found there was nutritionally induced plasticity in larval survival and morphology, although the latter effect was variable, with body size being most responsive to dietary macronutrients and genital size and shape being least responsive. Functionally equivalent morphological traits in the sexes responded similarly to nutrition. Previously, we showed that the genitalia of male and female T. castaneum are subject to strong stabilizing sexual selection, and our current findings suggest that developmental mechanisms reduce the nutritional sensitivity of male and female genitals, possibly to ensure matching during mating.

README: Nutrition affects larval survival and the development of morphological traits in male and female flour beetles, but genital size and shape remain canalized

https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.z8w9ghxmb

This data package contains 3 Excel files with raw data and 3 .csv files of the same data.

Genitals_nutrition_SurvivalData = the survival of larvae (0 = death, 1 = survived) when developing in 1 of 24 diets
RawMaleMorphologyData17_06_2024 = the morphology of male offspring that survived to eclosion
RawFemaleMorphologyData17_06_2024 = the morphology of female offspring

Version changes:

12-sept-2024: we have included the raw cartesian coordinates for the fixed and semi-landmarks for every male (file name = NGMalAllDiets) and every female (file name = NGFemAllDiets) genitalia. We also include a 'slider file' for male (file name = MSliders) and female (file name = fsliders) genitalia which defines which landmarks are fixed and those on the slide. These files are simple text files as this is how the cartesian coordinates are listed once the images have been processed in tpsdig264, (as described in the MS).

Genitals_nutrition_SurvivalData

col 1_ID of individual larva in a 24-well plate
col 2_diet number (coded from 1 to 24)
col 3_percentage protein (P) for the diet
col 4_percentage carbohydrate (C) for the diet
col 5_there were a total of nine replicate 24-well plates for a diet
col 6_response variable = survival. Larva that died were coded as a '0', or '1' if they survived.

RawFemaleMorphologyData17_06_2024

col 1_number of rows of data (redundant column)
col 2_unique identifiers for individual beetles (ID)
col 3_diet number (coded from 1 to 24)
col 4_there were a total of nine replicate 24-well plates for a diet. Not all beetles were measured and survival was very poor on some diets so the number of replicates was variable
col 5_percentage protein (P) for the diet
col 6_percentage carbohydrate (C) for the diet
col 7_response variable - female pronotum width (PW, units = mm)
col 8_response variable - female elytra width (EL, units = mm)
col 9_response variable - female centroid size (CS = genital size, the square root of landmarks from the centroid, unit-less measurement )
col 10_response variable - female relative warp 1 (RW1 = genital shape, principal components analysis of partial warps, unit-less measurement)
col 11_response variable - female relative warp 2 (RW2 = genital shape, principal components analysis of partial warps, unit-less measurement)
col 12_response variable - female relative warp 3 (RW3 = genital shape, principal components analysis of partial warps, unit-less measurement)
col 13_response variable - female relative warp 4 (RW4 = genital shape, principal components analysis of partial warps, unit-less measurement)

RawMaleMorphologyData17_06_2024

col 1_number of rows of data (redundant column)
col 2_unique identifiers for individual beetles (ID)
col 3_diet number (coded from 1 to 24)
col 4_there were a total of nine replicate 24-well plates for a diet. Not all beetles were measured, and survival was very poor on some diets, so the number of replicates was variable
col 5_percentage protein (P) for the diet
col 6_percentage carbohydrate (C) for the diet
col 7_response variable - male pronotum width (PW, units = mm)
col 8_response variable - male elytra width (EL, units = mm)
col 9_response variable - male centroid size (CS = genital size, the square root of landmarks from the centroid, unit-less measurement )
col 10_response variable - male relative warp 1 (RW1 = genital shape, principal components analysis of partial warps, unit-less measurement)
col 11_response variable - male relative warp 2 (RW2 = genital shape, principal components analysis of partial warps, unit-less measurement)
col 12_response variable - male relative warp 3 (RW3 = genital shape, principal components analysis of partial warps, unit-less measurement)
col 13_response variable - male relative warp 4 (RW4 = genital shape, principal components analysis of partial warps, unit-less measurement)

NGFemAllDiets

This is a text file of raw cartesian coordinates for each female genital image.

The first row is the number of landmarks LM=36.

This is followed by the x and y coordinate data for each landmark. Each x and y coordinate is on a new row.

Row 38 is the name of the image

Row 39 is the image ID starting at 0

This format is repeated for the next image.

NGMalAllDiets

This is a text file of coordinate data for male genital images.

The first row is the number of landmarks LM=19.

This is followed by the x and y coordinate data for each landmark. Each x and y coordinate is on a new row.

Row 21 is the name of the image

Row 22 is the image ID starting at 0

This format is repeated for the next image.

fsliders

This is a text file that specifies which landmarks are 'sliders'

row 1 is the name of the file

row 2 describes the attributes of the file - 1 18 3 0 - "1" is the 1st landmark, "18" is the number of sliders, and "3" is the number of columns.

The following rows specify that the sliders, slide between to other landmarks. For example, "1" is a fixed landmark, it doesn't slide. "2" slides between "1" and "3". "3" slides between "2" and "4" etc. The fixed landmarks never slide and are only ever in the 1st or 3rd column of data. The final landmark is "36" and is fixed.

MSliders