Step-by-step explanation:
Altruistic behavior in honey bee colonies, such as the sterile offspring of the queen that protect the nest and forage for food, can be explained through the theory of kin selection, which is a form of natural selection.
According to kin selection theory, individuals may behave altruistically toward their close relatives because they share a large proportion of their genes. This means that if an individual helps its relatives survive and reproduce, it indirectly increases the likelihood of its own genes being passed on to future generations.
In honey bee colonies, the sterile offspring of the queen are all female workers, who are all closely related to each other and to the queen. As such, their altruistic behavior can be explained as an example of kin selection, where the workers are sacrificing their own reproductive success to help their close relatives, including their mother, the queen, to produce more offspring and ensure the survival of the colony as a whole.
In addition, the sterile workers are not capable of reproducing themselves, so they would not benefit from investing in their own reproduction. Instead, their reproductive fitness is tied to the success of the queen and the colony as a whole, which is why they engage in altruistic behaviors that benefit the colony as a whole, even if it comes at a cost to their own survival and reproduction.
Therefore, the altruistic behavior of the sterile offspring in honey bee colonies can be explained through kin selection, which is a form of natural selection that favors behaviors that benefit an individual's close relatives and indirectly promote the survival and reproduction of the individual's own genes.