Social complexity varies tremendously across the ants. Some species have colonies made up of a few monomorphic individuals, while others have colonies with millions of highly polymorphic workers and one or more queens. We use a large phenotypic dataset with multiple traits related to social complexity, together with 117 ant genomes to elucidate the genomic changes associated with the repeated evolution of social complexity. We report genome-wide and gene-level shifts in patterns of molecular evolution associated with repeated transitions in social complexity across ants. Overall, our study identifies both common and lineage-specific genetic changes that are likely causes and consequences of the convergent evolution of complex social life.
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