Brain size predicts bees' tolerance to urban environments
Lanuza, Jose B. (Estación Biológica de Doñana)
Collado, Miguel Ángel (Universidad de Sevilla. Departamento de Ciencias de la Computación e Inteligencia Artificial)
Sayol Altarriba, Ferran (Centre de Recerca Ecològica i d'Aplicacions Forestals)
Sol Rueda, Daniel (Centre de Recerca Ecològica i d'Aplicacions Forestals)
Bartomeus, Ignasi (Estación Biológica de Doñana)

Data:	2023
Resum:	The rapid conversion of natural habitats to anthropogenic landscapes is threatening insect pollinators worldwide, raising concern regarding the negative consequences on their fundamental role as plant pollinators. However, not all pollinators are negatively affected by habitat conversion, as certain species find appropriate resources in anthropogenic landscapes to persist and proliferate. The reason why some species tolerate anthropogenic environments while most find them inhospitable remains poorly understood. The cognitive buffer hypothesis, widely supported in vertebrates but untested in insects, offers a potential explanation. This theory suggests that species with larger brains have enhanced behavioural plasticity, enabling them to confront and adapt to novel challenges. To investigate this hypothesis in insects, we measured brain size for 89 bee species, and evaluated their association with the degree of habitat occupancy. Our analyses revealed that bee species mainly found in urban habitats had larger brains relative to their body size than those that tend to occur in forested or agricultural habitats. Additionally, urban bees exhibited larger body sizes and, consequently, larger absolute brain sizes. Our results provide the first empirical support for the cognitive buffer hypothesis in invertebrates, suggesting that a large brain in bees could confer behavioural advantages to tolerate urban environments.
Ajuts:	Ministerio de Economía y Competitividad CGL2013-47448-P
Drets:	Aquest document està subjecte a una llicència d'ús Creative Commons. Es permet la reproducció total o parcial, la distribució, la comunicació pública de l'obra i la creació d'obres derivades, fins i tot amb finalitats comercials, sempre i quan es reconegui l'autoria de l'obra original.
Llengua:	Anglès
Document:	Article ; recerca ; Versió publicada
Matèria:	Relative brain size ; Habitat occupancy ; Apoidea ; Urbanization ; Pollinators
Publicat a:	Biology letters, Vol. 19, Issue 11 (November 2023) , art. 20230296, ISSN 1744-957X

DOI: 10.1098/rsbl.2023.0296
PMID: 38016644

6 p, 441.6 KB

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