ReviewJournal of chemical ecology2018
Queen Control or Queen Signal in Ants: What Remains of the Controversy 25 Years After Keller and Nonacs' Seminal Paper?
Review in Journal of chemical ecology, 2018. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 12 papers.
What it found
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
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Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
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Who cites it
12 citing papers in PubMed, 30 citations in OpenAlex.
- The alkenes Z9-CNature communications · 2025Article
- Multi-Omics Analysis RevealsEcology and evolution · 2025Article
- Test of the negative feedback hypothesis of colony size sensing in social insects.Biology letters · 2024Article
- Queen fecundity, worker entourage and cuticular chemistry in the antProceedings. Biological sciences · 2023Article
- Parasitic wasps avoid ant-protected hemipteran hosts via the detection of ant cuticular hydrocarbons.Proceedings. Biological sciences · 2021Article
- Low Virulence of the FungiFrontiers in microbiology · 2021Article
- Reproductive inhibition among nestmate queens in the invasive Argentine ant.Scientific reports · 2020Article
- The nesting preference of an invasive ant is associated with the cues produced by actinobacteria in soil.PLoS pathogens · 2020Article
- Pheromonal Regulation of the Reproductive Division of Labor in Social Insects.Frontiers in cell and developmental biology · 2020Review
- Queen Recognition Signals in Two Primitively Eusocial Halictid Bees: Evolutionary Conservation and Caste-Specific Perception.Insects · 2019Article
- Factors triggering queen executions in the Argentine ant.Scientific reports · 2019Article
- Preface: Pheromone-Mediation of Female Reproduction and Reproductive Dominance in Social Species.Journal of chemical ecology · 2018Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
4 authors at 3 institutions in 2 countries.
Funding
Abstract
Ant queen pheromones (QPs) have long been known to affect colony functioning. In many species, QPs affect important reproductive functions such as diploid larvae sexualization and egg-laying by workers, unmated queens (gynes), or other queens. Until the 1990s, these effects were generally viewed to be the result of queen manipulation through the use of coercive or dishonest signals. However, in their seminal 1993 paper, Keller and Nonacs challenged this idea, suggesting that QPs had evolved as honest signals that informed workers and other colony members of the queen's presence and reproductive state. This paper has greatly influenced the study of ant QPs and inspired numerous attempts to identify fertility-related compounds and test their physiological and behavioral effects. In the present article, we review the literature on ant QPs in various contexts and pay special attention to the role of cuticular hydrocarbons (CHCs). Although the controversy generated by Keller and Nonacs' (Anim Behav 45:787-794, 1993) paper is currently less intensively debated, there is still no clear evidence which allows the rejection of the queen control hypothesis in favor of the queen signal hypothesis. We argue that important questions remain regarding the mode of action of QPs, and their targets which may help understanding their evolution.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.