High-Arctic family planning: earlier spring onset advances age at first reproduction in barnacle geese.

abstract：:Reciprocity constitutes the prevalent mating mechanism among simultaneous hermaphrodites. Yet, when copulations in the female role confer fitness costs through male manipulation, it becomes advantageous sometimes to mate unilaterally in the male role only. In the sea slug Siphopteron quadrispinosum, acting males stab ...

journal_title：Biology letters

authors： Anthes N,Michiels NK

更新日期：2007-04-22 00:00:00

abstract：:Humans shift their attention to follow another person's gaze direction, a phenomenon called gaze cueing. This study examined whether a particular social factor, intergroup threat, modulates gaze cueing. As expected, stronger responses of a particular in-group to a threatening out-group were observed when the in-group,...

journal_title：Biology letters

authors： Chen Y,Zhao Y

更新日期：2015-02-01 00:00:00

abstract：:This study reports the first experimental exploration of possible contagious yawning in monkeys. Twenty-two stumptail macaques (Macaca arctoides) were presented with video clips of either yawns or control mouth movements by conspecifics. At a group level, monkeys yawned significantly more often during and just after t...

journal_title：Biology letters

authors： Paukner A,Anderson JR

更新日期：2006-03-22 00:00:00

abstract：:Natural populations of free-living protists often exhibit high-levels of intraspecific diversity, yet this is puzzling as classic evolutionary theory predicts dominance by genotypes with high fitness, particularly in large populations where selection is efficient. Here, we test whether negative frequency-dependent sel...

journal_title：Biology letters

authors： Minter EJ,Watts PC,Lowe CD,Brockhurst MA

更新日期：2015-06-01 00:00:00

abstract：:The study of birds, especially the Galapagos finches, was important to Darwin in the development of the theory of evolution by natural selection. Birds have also been at the centre of a recent reformulation in understanding cerebral evolution and the substrates for higher cognition. While it was once thought that bird...

journal_title：Biology letters

authors： Reiner A

更新日期：2009-02-23 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：: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：: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：:Lack of information is a constraint but ignorance can sometimes assist the evolution of cooperation by constraining selfishness. We discuss examples involving both ignorance of role or pay-off and ignorance of relatedness. Ignorance can favour cooperative traits like grouping and warning coloration and reduce conflict...

journal_title：Biology letters

authors： Queller DC,Strassmann JE

更新日期：2013-10-16 00:00:00

abstract：:Our study examines how the mutualism between Atta colombica leaf-cutting ants and their cultivated fungus is influenced by the presence of diverse foliar endophytic fungi (endophytes) at high densities in tropical leaf tissues. We conducted laboratory choice trials in which ant colonies chose between Cordia alliodora ...

journal_title：Biology letters

authors： Bittleston LS,Brockmann F,Wcislo W,Van Bael SA

更新日期：2011-02-23 00:00:00

abstract：:The dung beetle subfamily Scarabaeinae is a cosmopolitan group of insects that feed primarily on dung. We describe the first case of an obligate predatory dung beetle and contrast its behaviour and morphology with those of its coprophagous sympatric congeners. Deltochilum valgum Burmeister killed and consumed milliped...

journal_title：Biology letters

authors： Larsen TH,Lopera A,Forsyth A,Génier F

更新日期：2009-04-23 00:00:00

abstract：:In polygynous species, mate choice is an integrated part of sexual selection. However, whether mate choice occurs independently of the genetic relatedness among mating pairs has received little attention, although inbreeding may have fitness consequences. We studied whether genetic relatedness influenced females' choi...

journal_title：Biology letters

authors： Holand O,Askim KR,Røed KH,Weladji RB,Gjøstein H,Nieminen M

更新日期：2007-02-22 00:00:00

abstract：:A number of widely grown varieties of Vitis vinifera ssp. sativa, the grape used for wine production, are known to have resulted from crosses between Pinot noir and Gouais blanc, although it is not known which was the maternal parent in these crosses. We have analysed microsatellites and a single nucleotide polymorphi...

journal_title：Biology letters

authors： Hunt HV,Lawes MC,Bower MA,Haeger JW,Howe CJ

更新日期：2010-06-23 00:00:00

abstract：:Antarctic krill embryos and larvae were experimentally exposed to 380 (control), 1000 and 2000 µatm pCO₂ in order to assess the possible impact of ocean acidification on early development of krill. No significant effects were detected on embryonic development or larval behaviour at 1000 µatm pCO₂; however, at 2000 µat...

journal_title：Biology letters

authors： Kawaguchi S,Kurihara H,King R,Hale L,Berli T,Robinson JP,Ishida A,Wakita M,Virtue P,Nicol S,Ishimatsu A

更新日期：2011-04-23 00:00:00

abstract：:The somasteroids are Lower Palaeozoic star-shaped animals widely regarded as ancestors of Asterozoa, the group of echinoderms that includes brittle stars and starfish. However, the origin of asterozoans, the assembly of their distinctive body organization, and their relationships with other Cambrian and Ordovician ech...

journal_title：Biology letters

authors： Hunter AW,Ortega-Hernández J

更新日期：2021-01-01 00:00:00

abstract：:Honeybees maintain their colony throughout the cold winters, a strategy that enables them to make the most of early spring flowers. During this period, their activity is mostly limited to thermoregulation, while foraging and brood rearing are stopped. Less is known about seasonal changes to the essential task of defen...

journal_title：Biology letters

authors： Nouvian M,Deisig N,Reinhard J,Giurfa M

更新日期：2018-08-01 00:00:00

abstract：:Telomeres are regarded as markers of biological or cellular ageing because they shorten with the degree of stress exposure. Accordingly, telomere lengths should show different rates of change when animals are faced with different intensities of environmental challenges. However, a relationship between telomere length ...

journal_title：Biology letters

authors： Mizutani Y,Tomita N,Niizuma Y,Yoda K

更新日期：2013-08-14 00:00:00

abstract：:If a mother's nutritional status predicts the nutritional environment of the offspring, it would be adaptive for mothers experiencing nutritional stress to prime their offspring for a better tolerance to poor nutrition. We report that in Drosophila melanogaster, parents raised on poor larval food laid 3-6% heavier egg...

journal_title：Biology letters

authors： Vijendravarma RK,Narasimha S,Kawecki TJ

更新日期：2010-04-23 00:00:00

abstract：:Novel object trials are commonly used to assess aversion to novelty (neophobia), and previous work has shown neophobia can be influenced by the social environment, but whether the altered behaviour persists afterwards (social learning) is largely unknown in wild animals. We assessed house sparrow (Passer domesticus) n...

journal_title：Biology letters

authors： Kelly TR,Kimball MG,Stansberry KR,Lattin CR

更新日期：2020-09-01 00:00:00

abstract：:There is strong evidence for teaching in only a handful of species, most of which are cooperative breeders, leading some researchers to suggest that teaching may be more likely to evolve in such species. Alternatively, this initial distribution could be an artefact of the popularity and tractability of cooperative bre...

journal_title：Biology letters

authors： Howard M,Hoppitt W

更新日期：2017-08-01 00:00:00

abstract：:Wolves from the Great Lakes area were historically decimated due to habitat loss and predator control programmes. Under the protection of the US Endangered Species Act, the population has rebounded to approximately 3000 individuals. We show that the pre-recovery population was dominated by mitochondrial DNA haplotypes...

journal_title：Biology letters

authors： Leonard JA,Wayne RK

更新日期：2008-02-23 00:00:00

abstract：:Many geckos use adhesive toe pads on the bottom of their digits to attach to surfaces with remarkable strength. Although gecko adhesion has been studied for hundreds of years, gaps exist in our understanding at the whole-animal level. It remains unclear whether the strength and maintenance of adhesion are determined b...

journal_title：Biology letters

authors： Stewart WJ,Higham TE

更新日期：2014-12-01 00:00:00

abstract：:The perception of emotional expressions allows animals to evaluate the social intentions and motivations of each other. This usually takes place within species; however, in the case of domestic dogs, it might be advantageous to recognize the emotions of humans as well as other dogs. In this sense, the combination of v...

journal_title：Biology letters

authors： Albuquerque N,Guo K,Wilkinson A,Savalli C,Otta E,Mills D

更新日期：2016-01-01 00:00:00

abstract：:In contrast to daily rhythms that are common in the presence of the geophysical light-dark cycle, organisms at polar latitudes exhibit many diel activity patterns during natural periods of continuous solar light or darkness (polar day and night, respectively), from 24 h rhythms to arrhythmicity. In Arctic Greenland (7...

journal_title：Biology letters

authors： Huffeldt NP,Merkel FR

更新日期：2016-09-01 00:00:00

abstract：:Twenty years ago, the field of ancient DNA was launched with the publication of two short mitochondrial (mt) DNA sequences from a single quagga (Equus quagga) museum skin, an extinct South African equid (Higuchi et al. 1984 Nature312, 282-284). This was the first extinct species from which genetic information was retr...

journal_title：Biology letters

authors： Leonard JA,Rohland N,Glaberman S,Fleischer RC,Caccone A,Hofreiter M

更新日期：2005-09-22 00:00:00

abstract：:The evolution of visual warning signals is well known in animals but has received scant attention in plants. The coevolutionary hypothesis is the most influential hypothesis on warning signals in plants proposing that red and yellow leaf colours in autumn signal defensive strength to herbivores. So far, evidence in su...

journal_title：Biology letters

authors： Schaefer HM,Rolshausen G

更新日期：2007-02-22 00:00:00

abstract：:Trace metals produced by anthropogenic activities are of major importance in urban areas and might constitute a new evolutionary force selecting for the ability to cope with their deleterious effects. Interestingly, melanin pigments are known to bind metal ions, thereby potentially sequestering them in inert body part...

journal_title：Biology letters

authors： Chatelain M,Gasparini J,Jacquin L,Frantz A

更新日期：2014-03-26 00:00:00

abstract：:While we can usually understand the impacts of invasive species on recipient communities, invasion biology lacks methodologies that are potentially more predictive. Such tools should ideally be straightforward and widely applicable. Here, we explore an approach that compares the functional responses (FRs) of invader a...

journal_title：Biology letters

authors： Bollache L,Dick JT,Farnsworth KD,Montgomery WI

更新日期：2008-04-23 00:00:00

abstract：:Adaptive radiations often exhibit high levels of phenotypic replication, a phenomenon that can be explained by selection on standing variation in repeatedly divergent environments or by the influence of ancestral plasticity on selection in divergent environments. Here, we offer the first evidence that plastic loss of ...

journal_title：Biology letters

authors： Foster SA,O'Neil S,King RW,Baker JA

更新日期：2019-01-31 00:00:00

abstract：:It is increasingly recognized that hormetic environmental priming of stress responses can improve resilience to later life stress exposure. However, such phenotypic adjustments may be costly, particularly if the subsequent environment does not match that to which the adjustment was made. Here, we show that hormetic pr...

journal_title：Biology letters

authors： Costantini D,Monaghan P,Metcalfe NB

更新日期：2014-02-12 00:00:00