Dipteran larvae and microbes facilitate nutrient sequestration in the Nepenthes gracilis pitcher plant host.

abstract：:Long-distance migrants are particularly recognized for the distances covered on migration, yet little is known about the distances they cover during the rest of the year. GPS-tracks of 29 Montagu's harriers from breeding areas in France, The Netherlands and Denmark showed that harriers fly between 35 653 and 88 049 km...

journal_title：Biology letters

authors： Schlaich AE,Bouten W,Bretagnolle V,Heldbjerg H,Klaassen RHG,Sørensen IH,Villers A,Both C

更新日期：2017-06-01 00:00:00

abstract：:Bees are model organisms for the study of learning and memory, yet nearly all such research to date has used a single reward, nectar. Many bees collect both nectar (carbohydrates) and pollen (protein) on a single foraging bout, sometimes from different plant species. We tested whether individual bumblebees could learn...

journal_title：Biology letters

authors： Muth F,Papaj DR,Leonard AS

更新日期：2015-09-01 00:00:00

abstract：:Overlap in the form of sexual signals such as pheromones raises the possibility of reproductive interference by invasive species on similar, yet naive native species. Here, we test the potential for reproductive interference through heterospecific mate attraction and subsequent predation of males by females of a sexua...

journal_title：Biology letters

authors： Fea MP,Stanley MC,Holwell GI

更新日期：2013-11-27 00:00:00

abstract：:The ability to perceive the Earth's magnetic field, or magnetoreception, exists in numerous animals. Although the mechanism underlying magnetoreception has not been clearly established in any species, in salmonid fish, it is hypothesized to occur by means of crystals of magnetite associated with nervous tissue such as...

journal_title：Biology letters

authors： Fitak RR,Schweikert LE,Wheeler BR,Ernst DA,Lohmann KJ,Johnsen S

更新日期：2018-06-01 00:00:00

abstract：:There is growing interest in the capacity of mangrove ecosystems to sequester and store 'blue carbon'. Here, we provide a synthesis of 66 dated sediment cores with previously calculated carbon accumulation rates in mangrove ecosystems to assess the effects of environmental and anthropogenic pressures. Conserved sedime...

journal_title：Biology letters

authors： Pérez A,Libardoni BG,Sanders CJ

更新日期：2018-10-31 00:00:00

abstract：:Spatial and temporal heterogeneity in relative fitness of competing species is a key factor affecting the structure of communities. However, it is not intuitive why species that are ecologically similar should differ in their response to environmental changes. Here we show that two sympatric flycatchers differ in repr...

journal_title：Biology letters

authors： Qvarnström A,Svedin N,Wiley C,Veen T,Gustafsson L

更新日期：2005-03-22 00:00:00

abstract：:Regressive evolution of structures associated with vision in cave-dwelling organisms is the focus of intense research. Most work has focused on differences between extreme visual phenotypes: sighted, surface animals and their completely blind, cave-dwelling counterparts. We suggest that troglodytic systems, comprising...

journal_title：Biology letters

authors： Tobler M,Coleman SW,Perkins BD,Rosenthal GG

更新日期：2010-02-23 00:00:00

abstract：:The phenomenon of endocrine disruption is currently a source of growing concern. Feminization of male fish in UK rivers has been shown to occur extensively and has been linked with exposure to endocrine-disrupting compounds present in the environment. Much less is known of the extent and scale of endocrine disruption ...

journal_title：Biology letters

authors： Chesman BS,Langston WJ

更新日期：2006-09-22 00:00:00

abstract：:Although the presence of feathers in the nest is widespread among birds, it has not been previously suggested that feathers can be used as sexual signals. Females of the spotless starling (Sturnus unicolor) regularly carry feathers to their nest, mostly during laying and incubation. We show that the arrangement of the...

journal_title：Biology letters

authors： Veiga JP,Polo V

更新日期：2005-09-22 00:00:00

abstract：:Captive breeding is a high profile management tool used for conserving threatened species. However, the inevitable consequence of generations in captivity is broad scale and often-rapid phenotypic divergence between captive and wild individuals, through environmental differences and genetic processes. Although poorly ...

journal_title：Biology letters

authors： Slade B,Parrott ML,Paproth A,Magrath MJ,Gillespie GR,Jessop TS

更新日期：2014-11-01 00:00:00

abstract：:The brilliant red, orange and yellow colours of parrot feathers are the product of psittacofulvins, which are synthetic pigments known only from parrots. Recent evidence suggests that some pigments in bird feathers function not just as colour generators, but also preserve plumage integrity by increasing the resistance...

journal_title：Biology letters

authors： Burtt EH Jr,Schroeder MR,Smith LA,Sroka JE,McGraw KJ

更新日期：2011-04-23 00:00:00

abstract：:Group choruses of marine animals can produce extraordinarily loud sounds that markedly elevate levels of the ambient soundscape. We investigated sound production in the Gulf corvina (Cynoscion othonopterus), a soniferous marine fish with a unique reproductive behaviour threatened by overfishing, to compare with sounds...

journal_title：Biology letters

authors： Erisman BE,Rowell TJ

更新日期：2017-12-01 00:00:00

abstract：:The interaction between neuromuscular systems and body mechanics plays an important role in the production of coordinated movements in animals. Lepidopteran insects move their wings by distortion of the thorax structure via the indirect flight muscles (IFMs), which are activated by neural signals at every stroke. Howe...

journal_title：Biology letters

authors： Ando N,Kanzaki R

更新日期：2016-01-01 00:00:00

abstract：:Ecological resilience has become a focal concept in ecosystem management. Palaeoecological records (i.e. the sub-fossil remains preserved in sediments) are useful archives to address ecological resilience since they can be used to reconstruct long-term temporal variations in ecosystem properties. The special feature p...

journal_title：Biology letters

authors： Seddon AWR

更新日期：2021-01-01 00:00:00

abstract：:Many species exhibit prosocial behaviour, in which one individual's actions benefit another individual, often without an immediate benefit to itself. The neuropeptide oxytocin is an important hormonal mechanism influencing prosociality in mammals, but it is unclear whether the avian homologue mesotocin plays a similar...

journal_title：Biology letters

authors： Duque JF,Leichner W,Ahmann H,Stevens JR

更新日期：2018-04-01 00:00:00

abstract：:Partial migration occurs in many taxa and ecosystems and may confer survival benefits. Here, we use otolith chemistry data to determine whether fish from a large estuarine system were resident or migratory, and then examine whether contingents display differences in modelled growth based on changes in width of otolith...

journal_title：Biology letters

authors： Gillanders BM,Izzo C,Doubleday ZA,Ye Q

更新日期：2015-03-01 00:00:00

abstract：:The existence of consistent individual differences in behaviour ('animal personality') has been well documented in recent years. However, how such individual variation in behaviour is maintained over evolutionary time is an ongoing conundrum. A well-studied axis of animal personality is individual variation along a bo...

journal_title：Biology letters

authors： Ahlgren J,Chapman BB,Nilsson PA,Brönmark C

更新日期：2015-04-01 00:00:00

abstract：:Quantifying how key life-history traits respond to climatic change is fundamental in understanding and predicting long-term population prospects. Age at first reproduction (AFR), which affects fitness and population dynamics, may be influenced by environmental stochasticity but has rarely been directly linked to clima...

journal_title：Biology letters

authors： Fjelldal MA,Layton-Matthews K,Lee AM,Grøtan V,Loonen MJJE,Hansen BB

更新日期：2020-04-01 00:00:00

abstract：:While there is increasing interest in non-consumptive effects of predators on prey, physiological effects are understudied. While physiological stress responses play a crucial role in preparing escape responses, the increased metabolic rates and shunting of energy away from other body functions, including antioxidant ...

journal_title：Biology letters

authors： Janssens L,Stoks R

更新日期：2013-06-12 00:00:00

abstract：:The plight of the marine fisheries is attracting increasing attention as unsustainably high exploitation levels, exacerbated by more extreme climatic conditions, are driving stocks to the point of collapse. The North Atlantic cod (Gadus morhua), a species which until recently formed a major component of the demersal f...

journal_title：Biology letters

authors： Hutchinson WF

更新日期：2008-12-23 00:00:00

abstract：:Male bottlenose dolphins in Shark Bay, Western Australia form two levels of alliances; two to three males cooperate to herd individual females and teams of greater than three males compete with other groups for females. Previous observation suggested two alliance tactics: small four to six member teams of relatives th...

journal_title：Biology letters

authors： Connor RC,Watson-Capps JJ,Sherwin WB,Krützen M

更新日期：2011-08-23 00:00:00

abstract：:The fastest land animals are of intermediate size. Cheetah, antelope, greyhounds and racehorses have been measured running much faster than reported for elephants or elephant shrews. Can this be attributed to scaling of physical demands and explicit physiological constraints to supply? Here, we describe the scaling of...

journal_title：Biology letters

authors： Usherwood JR,Gladman NW

更新日期：2020-10-01 00:00:00

abstract：:The majority of the world's population now lives in towns and cities, and urban areas are expanding faster than any other land-use type. In response to this phenomenon, two opposing arguments have emerged: whether cities should 'sprawl' into the wider countryside, or 'densify' through the development of existing urban...

journal_title：Biology letters

authors： Dallimer M,Tang Z,Bibby PR,Brindley P,Gaston KJ,Davies ZG

更新日期：2011-10-23 00:00:00

abstract：:Tropical forests are experiencing structural changes that may reduce carbon storage potential. The recent increase in liana abundance and biomass is one such potential change. Lianas account for approximately 25 per cent of woody stems and may have a strong impact on tree dynamics because severe liana infestation redu...

journal_title：Biology letters

authors： Durán SM,Gianoli E

更新日期：2013-06-19 00:00:00

abstract：:Double cones (DCs) are the most common cone types in fish, reptiles and birds. It has been suggested that DCs are used for achromatic tasks such as luminance, motion and polarization vision. Here we show that a reef fish Rhinecanthus aculeatus can discriminate colours on the basis of the difference between the signals...

journal_title：Biology letters

authors： Pignatelli V,Champ C,Marshall J,Vorobyev M

更新日期：2010-08-23 00:00:00

abstract：:Most songbirds learn their songs from adult tutors, who can be their father or other male conspecifics. However, the variables that control song learning in a natural social context are largely unknown. We investigated whether the time of hatching of male domesticated canaries has an impact on their song development a...

journal_title：Biology letters

authors： Leitner S,Teichel J,Ter Maat A,Voigt C

更新日期：2015-08-01 00:00:00

abstract：:Malpighian tubules play an essential role in excretion, osmoregulation and immunity of most insects. Exceptionally, aphids lack Malpighian tubules, providing the opportunity to investigate the fate of genes expressed in an organ that has undergone evolutionary reduction and loss. Making use of the sequenced genomes of...

journal_title：Biology letters

authors： Jing X,White TA,Yang X,Douglas AE

更新日期：2015-05-01 00:00:00

abstract：:Coevolution with parasites is thought to maintain genetic diversity in host populations. However, while there are sound theoretical reasons to expect heterozygosity and parasite resistance to be related, this pattern has generally been shown only in inbred laboratory and island populations. This leaves doubt as to whe...

journal_title：Biology letters

authors： MacDougall-Shackleton EA,Derryberry EP,Foufopoulos J,Dobson AP,Hahn TP

更新日期：2005-03-22 00:00:00

abstract：:Historically, bird song has been regarded as a sex-specific signalling trait; males sing to attract females and females drive the evolution of signal exaggeration by preferring males with ever more complex songs. This view provides no functional role for female song. Historic geographical research biases generalized p...

journal_title：Biology letters

authors： Riebel K,Odom KJ,Langmore NE,Hall ML

更新日期：2019-04-26 00:00:00

abstract：:Valuing sedimentary 'blue carbon' stocks of seagrass meadows requires exclusion of allochthonous recalcitrant forms of carbon, such as black carbon (BC). Regression models constructed across a Southeast Asian tropical estuary predicted that carbon stocks within the sandy meadows of coastal embayments would support a m...

journal_title：Biology letters

authors： Gallagher JB,Chuan CH,Yap TK,Fredelina Dona WF

更新日期：2019-05-31 00:00:00