Papers by Jorge Contreras Garduño
Acta Tropica, 2021
The present work aimed to review the immune response from different triatomines against Trypanoso... more The present work aimed to review the immune response from different triatomines against Trypanosoma cruzi and Trypanosoma rangeli and propose the study of immune memory in such insects. Trypanosoma use triatomines as vectors to reach and infect mammals. A key question to be answered about vector-parasite interaction is why the immune defense and resistance of the insect against the parasites vary. Up to date data shows that the defense of triatomines against parasites includes cellular (phagocytosis, nodulation and encapsulation) and humoral (antimicrobial peptides, phenoloxidase and reactive oxygen and nitrogen species) responses. The immune response varies depending on the triatomine species, the trypanosome strain and species, and the insect intestinal microbiota. Despite significant advances to understand parasite-insect interaction, it is still unknown if triatomines have immune memory against parasites and if this memory may derive from tolerance to parasites attack. Therefore, a closer study of such interaction could contribute and establish new proposals to control the parasite at the vector level to reduce parasite transmission to mammals, including men. For instance, if immune memory exists in the triatomines, it would be interesting to induce weak infections in insects to find out if subsequent infections are less intense and if the insects succeed in eliminating the parasites.
Revista Mexicana de Biodiversidad, 2021
The study of the basic biology of panchronic species could help understand their persistence thro... more The study of the basic biology of panchronic species could help understand their persistence through geological time. One of the least studied panchronic species is Baronia brevicornis Salvin (Lepidoptera: Papilionidae), the oldest known butterfly species endemic to Mexico. Here we report on our findings from studying a population of B. brevicornis in Sierra de Huautla, Morelos, for 3 years. In this population we identified 3 male and 3 female color morphs, making it perhaps the most complex polymorphism described yet for a panchronic species. We found a balanced sex ratio in newly emerged adults but a sex ratio biased to males at reproductive sites. Significantly, we found adults of the butterfly only on patches of the host plant Vachellia campechiana (Mill.) Seigler & Ebinger (Fabaceae) that also offered feeding sources for adults and report for the first-time adults feeding on 5 plant species. Additionally, differences in water use in trees of V. campechiana in zones with or without B. brevicornis suggest a relationship between butterfly food sources and plant water expenditure. Our findings on B. brevicornis could be used to develop conservation plans for this species.
PeerJ, 2022
Free-living organisms face multiple stressors in their habitats, and habitat quality often affect... more Free-living organisms face multiple stressors in their habitats, and habitat quality often affects development and life history traits. Increasing pressures of agricultural intensification have been shown to influence diversity and abundance of insect pollinators, and it may affect their elemental composition as well. We compared reproductive success, body concentration of carbon (C) and nitrogen (N), and C/N ratio, each considered as indicators of stress, in the buff-tailed bumblebee (Bombus terrestris). Bumblebee hives were placed in oilseed rape fields and semi-natural old apple orchards. Flowering season in oilseed rape fields was longer than that in apple orchards. Reproductive output was significantly higher in oilseed rape fields than in apple orchards, while the C/N ratio of queens and workers, an indicator of physiological stress, was lower in apple orchards, where bumblebees had significantly higher body N concentration. We concluded that a more productive habitat, oilseed...
Supplemental material, WalterOpenPracticesDisclosure_rev for Sex Differences in Mate Preferences ... more Supplemental material, WalterOpenPracticesDisclosure_rev for Sex Differences in Mate Preferences Across 45 Countries: A Large-Scale Replication by Kathryn V. Walter, Daniel Conroy-Beam, David M. Buss, Kelly Asao, Agnieszka Sorokowska, Piotr Sorokowski, Toivo Aavik, Grace Akello, Mohammad Madallh Alhabahba, Charlotte Alm, Naumana Amjad, Afifa Anjum, Chiemezie S. Atama, Derya Atamtürk Duyar, Richard Ayebare, Carlota Batres, Mons Bendixen, Aicha Bensafia, Boris Bizumic, Mahmoud Boussena, Marina Butovskaya, Seda Can, Katarzyna Cantarero, Antonin Carrier, Hakan Cetinkaya, Ilona Croy, Rosa María Cueto, Marcin Czub, Daria Dronova, Seda Dural, Izzet Duyar, Berna Ertugrul, Agustín Espinosa, Ignacio Estevan, Carla Sofia Esteves, Luxi Fang, Tomasz Frackowiak, Jorge Contreras Garduño, Karina Ugalde González, Farida Guemaz, Petra Gyuris, Mária Halamová, Iskra Herak, Marina Horvat, Ivana Hromatko, Chin-Ming Hui, Jas Laile Jaafar, Feng Jiang, Konstantinos Kafetsios, Tina Kavčič, Leif Edward Ottese...
Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, 2021
A wide range of literature connects sex ratio and mating behaviours in non-human animals. However... more A wide range of literature connects sex ratio and mating behaviours in non-human animals. However, research examining sex ratio and human mating is limited in scope. Prior work has examined the relationship between sex ratio and desire for short-term, uncommitted mating as well as outcomes such as marriage and divorce rates. Less empirical attention has been directed towards the relationship between sex ratio and mate preferences, despite the importance of mate preferences in the human mating literature. To address this gap, we examined sex ratio's relationship to the variation in preferences for attractiveness, resources, kindness, intelligence and health in a long-term mate across 45 countries ( n = 14 487). We predicted that mate preferences would vary according to relative power of choice on the mating market, with increased power derived from having relatively few competitors and numerous potential mates. We found that each sex tended to report more demanding preferences fo...
Drosophila melanogaster Ronalds KRAMS, Tatjana KRAMA, Māris MUNKEVICS, Sarah EICHLER, David M. BU... more Drosophila melanogaster Ronalds KRAMS, Tatjana KRAMA, Māris MUNKEVICS, Sarah EICHLER, David M. BUTLER, Linda DOBKEVIČA, Priit JÕERS, Jorge CONTRERAS‐GARDUÑO, Janīna DAUKŠTE, and Indrikis A. KRAMS Chair of Plant Health, Estonian University of Life Sciences, Tartu 51006, Estonia; Department of Biotechnology, Daugavpils University, Daugavpils 5401, Latvia; Institute of Ecology and Earth Sciences, University of Tartu, Tartu 51010, Estonia; Department of Zoology and Animal Ecology, Faculty of Biology, University of Latvia, Riga 1004, Latvia; Department of Biological Sciences, Kent State University, Ohio, Salem 44460, United States; Department of Plant Sciences, University of Tennessee, Knoxville 37996‐4561, United States; Department of Environmental Science, Faculty of Geography and Earth Sciences, University of Latvia, Riga 1004, Latvia; Department of General and Microbial Biochemistry, University of Tartu, Tartu 51010, Estonia; Escuela Nacional de Estudios Superiores Unidad Morelia, Un...
Adaptive Human Behavior and Physiology, 2021
Objective Phenotypic markers associated with developmental stability such as fluctuating asymmetr... more Objective Phenotypic markers associated with developmental stability such as fluctuating asymmetry, facial attractiveness, and reports of minor ailments can also act as indicators of overall physical health. However, few studies have assessed whether these markers might also be cues of mental health. We tested whether self- and other-perceived facial attractiveness, fluctuating asymmetry, and minor ailments are associated with psychopathological symptoms in a mixed sample of 358 college students, controlling for the effects of body mass index, age, and sex. Methods We applied the Symptom Checklist-90-Revised (SCL-90-R) questionnaire to assess psychopathological symptoms, a battery of questionnaires about self-perceptions of facial attractiveness, and gathered information about the number of previous minor ailments as well as demographic data. Other-perceived attractiveness was assessed by an independent mixed sample of 109 subjects. Subjects’ facial fluctuating asymmetry was determi...
Journal of Fungi, 2020
Juvenile hormone has been suggested to be a potential mediator in the trade-off between mating an... more Juvenile hormone has been suggested to be a potential mediator in the trade-off between mating and insects’ immunity. Studies on various insect taxons have found that juvenile hormone interferes with humoral and cellular immunity. Although this was shown experimentally, studies using highly virulent parasites or pathogens are lacking so far. In this study, we tested if juvenile hormone administration affected resistance against entomopathogenic fungi, Metarhizium robertsii, in the mealworm beetle, Tenebrio molitor. In previous studies with T. molitor, juvenile hormone has been found to reduce a major humoral immune effector-system (phenoloxidase) in both sexes and decrease the encapsulation response in males. Here, we found that juvenile hormone administration prolonged survival time after infection with M. robertsii in males but reduced survival time in females. This study indicates that the effects of juvenile hormone on insect immunity might be more complicated than previously co...
Frontiers in Physiology, 2021
Ecological stoichiometry is important for revealing how the composition of chemical elements of o... more Ecological stoichiometry is important for revealing how the composition of chemical elements of organisms is influenced by their physiological functions and ecology. In this study, we investigated the elemental body composition of queens, workers, and males of the bumblebee Bombus terrestris, an important pollinator throughout Eurasia, North America, and northern Africa. Our results showed that body elemental content differs among B. terrestris castes. Young queens and workers had higher body nitrogen concentration than ovipositing queens and males, while castes did not differ significantly in their body carbon concentration. Furthermore, the carbon-to-nitrogen ratio was higher in ovipositing queens and males. We suggest that high body nitrogen concentration and low carbon-to-nitrogen ratio in young queens and workers may be related to their greater amount of flight muscles and flight activities than to their lower stress levels. To disentangle possible effects of stress in the agri...
Psychological Science, 2020
Considerable research has examined human mate preferences across cultures, finding universal sex ... more Considerable research has examined human mate preferences across cultures, finding universal sex differences in preferences for attractiveness and resources as well as sources of systematic cultural variation. Two competing perspectives—an evolutionary psychological perspective and a biosocial role perspective—offer alternative explanations for these findings. However, the original data on which each perspective relies are decades old, and the literature is fraught with conflicting methods, analyses, results, and conclusions. Using a new 45-country sample ( N = 14,399), we attempted to replicate classic studies and test both the evolutionary and biosocial role perspectives. Support for universal sex differences in preferences remains robust: Men, more than women, prefer attractive, young mates, and women, more than men, prefer older mates with financial prospects. Cross-culturally, both sexes have mates closer to their own ages as gender equality increases. Beyond age of partner, ne...
Current Zoology, 2018
Copulatory plugs (CP) are substances produced during copulation that block the genital openings o... more Copulatory plugs (CP) are substances produced during copulation that block the genital openings of the female. In several species of Nematoda, males produce CP that are thought to impede female remating and thus sperm competition. The relatively large size of the CP in several nematodes, and its evolutionary loss in self-fertilizing populations of Caenorhabditis elegans, suggests that CP are costly to produce. If CP production is costly, the application of basic concepts of strategic ejaculation theory suggests a modulated allocation of CP in response to sperm competition risk. This hypothesis led us to predict that males perceiving a higher risk of sperm competition will produce larger CP. We tested these ideas with the entomopathogenic, gonochoristic nematode Rhabditis regina. Our first experiment provides evidence suggesting that production of CP is costly, because the size of CP is negatively affected by stressful conditions (high population density, small male adult size, and s...
Behaviour, 2019
The development of indirect mechanisms of intrasexual competition (e.g., visual identification of... more The development of indirect mechanisms of intrasexual competition (e.g., visual identification of possible rivals) could be related to personality traits such as aggressiveness and self-esteem. However, the study of endocrine changes associated to indirect mechanisms of intrasexual competition is scarce. The aim of this study was to investigate the changes in testosterone levels after a rival choice test in men and how intrasexual competitiveness, aggressiveness, and self-esteem modulate these changes. A group of 160 healthy men answered four personality questionnaires, participated in a rival choice test, and donated saliva samples to measure the changes in their testosterone levels. We found a significant decrease in testosterone levels of men with lower intrasexual competitiveness, but testosterone levels remained stables in competitive men. Non-significant results were found for aggressiveness and self-esteem. These decreases in testosterone levels could be interpreted as an ada...
Evolution and Human Behavior, 2019
Mate choice lies close to differential reproduction, the engine of evolution. Patterns of mate ch... more Mate choice lies close to differential reproduction, the engine of evolution. Patterns of mate choice consequently have power to direct the course of evolution. Here we provide evidence suggesting one pattern of human mate choice-the tendency for mates to be similar in overall desirability-caused the evolution of a structure of correlations that we call the d factor. We use agent-based models to demonstrate that assortative mating causes the evolution of a positive manifold of desirability, d, such that an individual who is desirable as a mate along any one dimension tends to be desirable across all other dimensions. Further, we use a large cross-cultural sample with n = 14,478 from 45 countries around the world to show that this d-factor emerges in human samples, is a cross-cultural universal, and is patterned in a way consistent with an evolutionary history of assortative mating. Our results suggest that assortative mating can explain the evolution of a broad structure of human trait covariation.
The Journal of Experimental Biology, 2019
In invertebrates, it has recently been reported that secondary sexual characteristics (SSCs) refl... more In invertebrates, it has recently been reported that secondary sexual characteristics (SSCs) reflect the antioxidant defense of their bearers, but it is not known what physiological link maintains the honesty of those signals. Here, we used the damselfly Hetaerina americana to test whether juvenile hormone plays such a role. First, we analyzed whether oxidative damage is a real threat in natural damselfly populations by examining the accumulation of oxidized guanines as a function of age in males. Then, we injected paraquat (a pro-oxidant agent) and added the juvenile hormone analog methoprene (JHa) to the experimental group and the JHa vehicle (acetone) to the control group, to determine whether JHa increases the levels of pro-oxidants and antioxidants. We found that DNA oxidation increased with age, and that levels of hydrogen peroxide and superoxide dismutase, but not catalase or glutathione, were elevated in the JHa group compared with the control group. We propose that juvenile hormone is a mediator of the relationship between SSCs and antioxidant capacity and, based on the literature, we know that JHa suppresses the immune response. We therefore suggest that juvenile hormone is a molecular mediator of the general health of males, which is reflected in their SSCs.
Polish Journal of Ecology, 2017
The Journal of Experimental Biology, 2017
Communities of symbiotic microorganisms that colonize the gastrointestinal tract play an importan... more Communities of symbiotic microorganisms that colonize the gastrointestinal tract play an important role in food digestion and protection against opportunistic microbes. Diet diversity increases the number of symbionts in the intestines, a benefit that is considered to impose no cost for the host organism. However, less is known about the possible immunological investments that hosts have to make in order to control the infections caused by symbiont populations that increase due to diet diversity. By using taxonomical composition analysis of the 16S rRNA V3 region, we show that Enterococci are the dominating group of bacteria in the midgut of the larvae of the greater wax moth (Galleria mellonella). We found that the number of colony-forming units (CFU) of Enterococci and expressions of certain immunity-related antimicrobial peptide (AMP) genes such as Gallerimycin, Gloverin, 6-tox, Cecropin-D and Galiomicin increased in response to a more diverse diet, which in turn decreased the en...
Parasitology Research, 2016
Here we report the presence of the entomopathogenic nematode Rhabditis (Rhabditoides) regina affe... more Here we report the presence of the entomopathogenic nematode Rhabditis (Rhabditoides) regina affecting white grubs (Phyllophaga sp. and Anomala sp.) in Mexico and R. regina-associated bacteria. Bioassays were performed to test the entomopathogenic capacity of dauer and L2 and L3 (combined) larval stages. Furthermore, we determined the diversity of bacteria from laboratory nematodes cultivated for 2 years (dauer and L2-L3 larvae) and from field nematodes (dauer and L2-L3 larvae) in addition to the virulence in Galleria mellonella larvae of some bacterial species from both laboratory and field nematodes. Dauer and non-dauer larvae of R. regina killed G. mellonella. Bacteria such as Serratia sp. (isolated from field nematodes) and Klebsiella sp. (isolated from larvae of laboratory and field nematodes) may explain R. regina entomopathogenic capabilities. Different bacteria were found in nematodes after subculturing in the laboratory suggesting that R. regina may acquire bacteria in different environments. However, there were some consistently found bacteria from laboratory and field nematodes such as Pseudochrobactrum sp., Comamonas sp., Alcaligenes sp., Klebsiella sp., Acinetobacter sp., and Leucobacter sp. that may constitute the nematode microbiome. Results showed that some bacteria contributing to entomopathogenicity may be lost in the laboratory representing a disadvantage when nematodes are cultivated to be used for biological control.
Open Journal of Ecology, 2013
In insects, juvenile hormone (JH) decreases or has any effect upon the phenoloxidase (PO) activit... more In insects, juvenile hormone (JH) decreases or has any effect upon the phenoloxidase (PO) activity, and favors or decreases the Antimicrobial Peptides (AMPs) expression. Although there is no information about the differential effect of such hormone, two possibilities are that it depends on (a) the immune marker recorded and (b) sexual differences. Here, three commonly used immune markers, Phenoloxidase (PO), hydrogen peroxide (H 2 O 2), and lytic activity, were measured 3, 6 and 24 hours after administration of methoprene (JHa, an analog of juvenile hormone) in male and female monarch butterflies (Danaus plexippus). At 3 and 6 h post-JHa administration, the PO activity increased in females but it only increased at 3 h in males, whereas H 2 O 2 levels increased only in females at 3 h. For the remaining times the JHa had a null effect on PO and H 2 O 2. On the other hand, the JHa had a null effect for lytic activity in both sexes at 3, 6 and 24 h. To our knowledge, this is the first report of a positive effect of a JHa on PO and H 2 O 2 and suggests that this effect is sex dependent.
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Papers by Jorge Contreras Garduño