Field of Research:
Molecular Biology and Physiology of Nerve and Glia Cells
In Germany:
01.03.2021 -
28.02.2026
Host's project description
From worker to queen
In an ant colony, there is great diversity. Queen, soldiers, and workers form different castes can vary greatly in appearance and behaviour – even though all individuals have the same genes. It is therefore not the genes themselves that cause the differences, but their regulation, likely via so-called epigenetic marks in the genome. These control the activity of genes, thus playing a central role in the development of different behaviours and appearances.
Ants are therefore ideal targets for research into epigenetic pathways in the brain. Roberto Bonasio has decoded the genome of the ant species Harpegnathos saltator with a great degree of accuracy. The species has since developed into a model organism that enables researchers to investigate the effects of epigenetic changes.
Harpegnathos saltator occurs in India and grows to a length of two to three centimetres. The animals live in small colonies with a queen that does not look very different from the other members of the colony, but behaves profoundly different. Adult Harpegnathos workers have the rare ability among ants to transform themselves into so-called pseudo-queens. They then behave like real queens, lay eggs and have an extended lifespan compared to workers. Bonasio and his team can artificially trigger this transformation in the laboratory and thus analyse the changes in the animals' gene activity.
In this way, the researchers can study the epigenetic marks, transcription factors – proteins that control the activity of genes – and neural messengers that are responsible for this change of caste. They have identified hundreds of genes that change their activity in the animals' brains when workers are transformed into pseudo-queens. In particular, the gene for corazonin, a peptide consisting of a few amino acids, is particularly active in the brains of workers. In a series of sophisticated experiments, Bonasio and his team have shown that this gene is responsible for different behaviours of the workers, for example hunting and food procurement for the queen.
From Pennsylvania to Freiburg
For these and other important discoveries and for his merits in the development of new research methods, Roberto Bonasio is awarded the Max Planck-Humboldt Research Award, which honours particularly innovative researchers abroad. Bonasio grew up in Sesto Calende, on the Lake Maggiore and initially studied biotechnology in Milan. After stations at Harvard and New York University, he has been heading his own laboratory at the University of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine since 2014.
The award also includes funds for a research collaboration with the University of Freiburg. Together with neuroscientists and epigeneticists from Freiburg, Bonasio plans to investigate the restructuring of the brain in individuals who alternate between worker and queen status. The findings on the epigenetic control of these changes in the brain might also be relevant for neurological diseases.
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Home Institute
Department of Cell and Development Biology
University of Pennsylvania
3400 Civic Center Blvd
19104
Philadelphia
Host in Germany
Prof. Dr. H.T. Marc Timmers
Medizinische Fakultät
Albert-Ludwigs-Universität Freiburg
Elsässer Straße 2m
79110
Freiburg
Prof. Dr. Marco Prinz
Medizinische Fakultät
Albert-Ludwigs-Universität Freiburg
Elsässer Straße 2m
79110
Freiburg
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