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Altruism and social cheating in the social amoeba Dictyostelium discoideum

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  • Joan E. Strassmann

    (Rice University)

  • Yong Zhu

    (Rice University)

  • David C. Queller

    (Rice University)

Abstract

The social amoeba, Dictyostelium discoideum, is widely used as a simple model organism for multicellular development1,2, but its multicellular fruiting stage is really a society. Most of the time, D. discoideum lives as haploid, free-living, amoeboid cells that divide asexually. When starved, 104–105 of these cells aggregate into a slug. The anterior 20% of the slug altruistically differentiates into a non-viable stalk, supporting the remaining cells, most of which become viable spores3,4,5. If aggregating cells come from multiple clones, there should be selection for clones to exploit other clones by contributing less than their proportional share to the sterile stalk. Here we use microsatellite markers to show that different clones collected from a field population readily mix to form chimaeras. Half of the chimaeric mixtures show a clear cheater and victim. Thus, unlike the clonal and highly cooperative development of most multicellular organisms, the development of D. discoideum is partly competitive, with conflicts of interests among cells. These conflicts complicate the use of D. discoideum as a model for some aspects of development, but they make it highly attractive as a model system for social evolution.

Suggested Citation

  • Joan E. Strassmann & Yong Zhu & David C. Queller, 2000. "Altruism and social cheating in the social amoeba Dictyostelium discoideum," Nature, Nature, vol. 408(6815), pages 965-967, December.
  • Handle: RePEc:nat:nature:v:408:y:2000:i:6815:d:10.1038_35050087
    DOI: 10.1038/35050087
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    Cited by:

    1. Dimitris Iliopoulos & Arend Hintze & Christoph Adami, 2010. "Critical Dynamics in the Evolution of Stochastic Strategies for the Iterated Prisoner's Dilemma," PLOS Computational Biology, Public Library of Science, vol. 6(10), pages 1-8, October.
    2. Fernando W Rossine & Ricardo Martinez-Garcia & Allyson E Sgro & Thomas Gregor & Corina E Tarnita, 2020. "Eco-evolutionary significance of “loners”," PLOS Biology, Public Library of Science, vol. 18(3), pages 1-27, March.
    3. Peña, Jorge & Cooper, Guy Alexander & Liu, Ming & West, Stuart Andrew, 2020. "Dividing labour in social microorganisms: coordinated or random specialisation?," IAST Working Papers 20-104, Institute for Advanced Study in Toulouse (IAST).
    4. Van Cleve, Jeremy, 2015. "Social evolution and genetic interactions in the short and long term," Theoretical Population Biology, Elsevier, vol. 103(C), pages 2-26.
    5. Bryan L. Gitschlag & Claudia V. Pereira & James P. Held & David M. McCandlish & Maulik R. Patel, 2024. "Multiple distinct evolutionary mechanisms govern the dynamics of selfish mitochondrial genomes in Caenorhabditis elegans," Nature Communications, Nature, vol. 15(1), pages 1-14, December.
    6. Mariko Katoh-Kurasawa & Peter Lehmann & Gad Shaulsky, 2024. "The greenbeard gene tgrB1 regulates altruism and cheating in Dictyostelium discoideum," Nature Communications, Nature, vol. 15(1), pages 1-9, December.

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