Spermless males fail to remedy the low fecundity of parthenogenetic females in D. melanogaster

TL;DR

Using spermless males to increase reproduction in parthenogenetic fruit flies failed due to the short lifespan of the females.

Contribution

The study reveals that parthenogenetic females are more resilient to spermless males but have shorter lifespans when not paired.

Findings

Parthenogenetic females have abysmal fecundity despite mating with spermless males.

Parthenogenetic females live shorter lives when not paired but are more resistant to harm from spermless males.

Using spermless males to boost reproduction in parthenogenetic females only provides a short-lived benefit.

Abstract

The recent construction of a parthenogenetic strain of
D. melanogaster
offers new avenues of research, but this potential is limited by the stock’s abysmal fecundity. We tried using spermless (placebo) males to “trick” the virgins into producing more offspring, but the boost that we achieved proved to be short-lived due to premature death of the mothers. To explore the cause of this mortality, we compared the lifespans of parthenogenetic vs. wild-type females when mated with spermless males. We found that parthenogenetic females are less robust than wild-females when raised alone but are more resistant to harm from spermless males.

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