Female Sensitivity to Diet and Irradiation Treatments Underlies Sex-Mortality Differentials in the Mediterranean Fruit Fly

Authors

James R. Carey, University of California, DavisFollow
Pablo Liedo, El Colegio de la Frontera SurFollow
Hans-Georg Müller, University of California, DavisFollow
Jane-Ling Wang, University of California, DavisFollow
Brad Love, University of California, Davis
Lawrence G. Harshman, University of Nebraska–LincolnFollow
Linda Partridge, University College LondonFollow

Date of this Version

2001

Document Type

Article

Citation

Journal of Gerontology: Biological Sciences 56A:2 (2001), pp. B89–B93.

Comments

Copyright © 2001 The Gerontological Society of America. Used by permission.

Abstract

Large-scale experiments on medflies that were subjected to sterilizing doses of ionizing radiation (plus intact controls) and maintained on either sugar-only or full, protein-enriched diets revealed that, whereas the mortality trajectories of both intact and irradiated male cohorts maintained on both diets are similar, the mortality patterns of females are highly variable. Mean mortality rates at 35 days in male cohorts ranged from 0.2 to 0.3 but in female cohorts ranged from 0.09 to 0.35, depending on treatment. The study reports three main influences: (a) qualitative differences exist in the sex–mortality response of medflies subjected to dietary manipulations and irradiation, (b) the female mortality response is linked to increased vulnerability due to the nutritional demands of reproduction, and (c) female sensitivity to environmental changes underlies the dynamics of the sex-mortality differential.