Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • adjective Of or relating to a system of sexual determination in which diploid females develop from fertilized eggs and haploid males develop from unfertilized eggs, as in most hymenopterans, such as ants and bees, and certain other invertebrates.
  • noun A haplodiploid organism or species.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • adjective biology, of a species In which members of one sex are haploid and members of the other are diploid; found especially in the Hymenoptera
  • noun Such an organism

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[From Greek haploos, single; see haploid + diploos, double; see diploid + –oid.]

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Examples

  • The reason Wilson initially supported kin selection theory was the haplodiploid hypothesis, which I will explain in detail in chapter 8.

    SuperCooperators Martin A. Nowak 2011

  • For example, among the 70,000 or so known parasitoid and other apocritan Hymenoptera, one of the largest orders of insects, all of whom are haplodiploid, no eusocial species has been found.

    SuperCooperators Martin A. Nowak 2011

  • The haplodiploid hypothesis felt like a magical key that could unlock new mysteries as effectively as the recently found structure of DNA.

    SuperCooperators Martin A. Nowak 2011

  • He argued that the haplodiploid mechanism of sex determination in Hymenoptera predisposed them to the evolution of cooperation via kin selection.

    At What Level did this Evolve? 2009

  • In a haplodiploid species sisters are 75 percent related, but mother and daughter are only 50 percent related.

    SuperCooperators Martin A. Nowak 2011

  • Therefore, haplodiploid individuals that become part of a social caste specialized for the rearing of sisters would experience a selective advantage, as their genes would have a greater prevalence in the gene pool due to this close relationship with their true sisters.

    The Volokh Conspiracy » Democracy and the Appeal of Socialism 2010

  • At the same time, examples have emerged of eusocial creatures that are diploid rather than haplodiploid in sex determination.

    SuperCooperators Martin A. Nowak 2011

  • Unsurprisingly, the haplodiploid hypothesis has now been abandoned by many who study social insects.

    SuperCooperators Martin A. Nowak 2011

  • Therefore, haplodiploid individuals that become part of a social caste specialized for the rearing of sisters would experience a selective advantage, as their genes would have a greater prevalence in the gene pool due to this close relationship with their true sisters.

    The Volokh Conspiracy » Democracy and the Appeal of Socialism 2010

  • First, though, here's a little background on haplodiploid sex determinatiion.

    Clone war of the sexes - The Panda's Thumb 2005

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