Figure 2

Differences in egg surface hydrocarbons. (A) Representative chromatograms showing the egg surface hydrocarbons on eggs laid by an established queen, eggs laid by an incipient queen, and eggs laid by workers. The shorter-chained compounds involved in fertility signalling appear to the left of the dotted line. The peak representing 3-methylheptacosane (3-MeC27), the most prominent compound in the fertility signal, is labelled. Also labelled are the peaks representing straight-chain alkanes n-pentacosane (C25) and n-heptacosane (C27). Additional compound identities are published in [19]. (B) The percentage of egg surface hydrocarbons represented by all shorter-chained, fertility-related compounds (top) and 3-methylheptacosane (bottom). Points, boxes, and whiskers represent medians, quartiles, and ranges, respectively. Letters indicate significant pairwise differences between eggs from different sources at α = 0.05. All shorter-chained, fertility-related hydrocarbons: median test, χ² = 30.2077, p < 0.0001, d.f. = 4. 3-Methylheptacosane: median test, χ² = 41.9077, p < 0.0001, d.f. = 4.