Do beetles have maternal instincts?
Hidden in the thick foliage of tropical forests a subfamily of colorful beetles hides the secrets of the earliest stages of social behavior, showing explicit signs of maternal instincts and care. An international team of scientists from the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute, Centro Universitário de Lavras, Staatliches Museum für Naturkunde Karlsruhe, and Université libre de Bruxelles looked into the complex subsocial behaviors present in the extraordinary Chrysomelinae subfamily to discover and describe in detail the different degrees of maternal instincts present within 8 species. The exciting insight into the biology of these species was published in the 4th "Research on Chrysomelidae" special issue of the open access journal Zookeys, alongside 6 other research articles on the family.