Kin selection in cooperative alliances of carrion crows

Science

Volumn 300, Issue 5627, 2003, Pages 1947-1949

  Baglione, Vittorio ^a   Canestrari, Daniela ^a   Marcos, José M ^b   Ekman, Jan ^a  

^a UPPSALA UNIVERSITY   (Sweden)

^b UNIVERSITY OF SEVILLE   (Spain)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

BIOLOGY; GENES;

KIN SELECTION;

BIODIVERSITY;

MICROSATELLITE DNA;

BIRD; COOPERATIVE BREEDING; KIN SELECTION; NATAL DISPERSAL; VERTEBRATE;

ARTICLE; BIRD; BREEDING; CONTROLLED STUDY; CORVUS CORONE; FEMALE; GENE FREQUENCY; KIN SELECTION; MALE; MATING; NONHUMAN; PHILOPATRY; PRIORITY JOURNAL; SOCIAL BEHAVIOR;

ANIMALS; BEHAVIOR, ANIMAL; BREEDING; COOPERATIVE BEHAVIOR; EVOLUTION; FEMALE; MALE; MICROSATELLITE REPEATS; REPRODUCTION; SELECTION (GENETICS); SEXUAL BEHAVIOR, ANIMAL; SOCIAL BEHAVIOR; SONGBIRDS; SPAIN; TERRITORIALITY;

AVES; CORVIDAE; CORVUS CORONE; VERTEBRATA;

EID: 0037938709     PISSN: 00368075     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1126/science.1082429     Document Type: Article

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14. DNA was extracted from blood samples (50 to 200 μl of blood from each individual). We unambiguously genotyped 137 individuals at six polymorphic microsatellite loci (five alleles on average). No loci deviated from Hardy-Weinberg expectations. For details on DNA extraction, primers, and genotyping procedure, see (11). Briefly, alleles were amplified by means of the polymerase chain reaction (PCR), separated by polyacrylamide electrophoresis, and visualized with silver staining. Estimates of relatedness (r) were calculated using the software Relatedness (21). We obtained precise average estimates for categories of individuals of known relatedness [parent-offspring, n = 96, (expected mean r)/(estimated mean r) ± SE = 0.5/0.48 ± 0.02; full siblings, n = 67, (expected mean r)/(estimated mean r) ± SE = 0.5/0.48 ± 0.04], indicating the reliability of relatedness assessment. Crows were sexed with the P2/P8 molecular sexing method (22).
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24. The correlation between pairwise estimates of relatedness and geographic distance between the territories where individuals were settled could be biased by the particular structure of the data set. We therefore accompanied the standard analysis with a randomization test. We bootstrapped the original matrices (relatedness r values and distances) 4999 times, calculating the Pearson coefficient of correlation at each step. The proportion of times that the bootstrapped coefficient exceeded the observed value gave the P value of the test.
25. We thank A. Cockburn, J. Höglund, D. Jones, and D. Winkler for reviewing the manuscript; H. Kokko, P. Pamilo, A. Pilastro, and B. Montgomerie for useful comments and suggestions; P. Zumel for help in the field; G. Olsson, H. Tegelström, S. Griffith, and L. Shorey for help in the lab; and J. Garcia del Canto and J. Navarro for technical support. Supported by the Training and Mobility of Researchers "Marie Curie" program of the European Commission (to V.B.).