Long-term and persistent vocal plasticity in adult bats.

ABSTRACT: Bats exhibit a diverse and complex vocabulary of social communication calls some of which are believed to be learned during development. This ability to produce learned, species-specific vocalizations - a rare trait in the animal kingdom - requires a high-degree of vocal plasticity. Bats live extremely long lives in highly complex and dynamic social environments, which suggests that they might also retain a high degree of vocal plasticity in adulthood, much as humans do. Here, we report persistent vocal plasticity in adult bats (Rousettus aegyptiacus) following exposure to broad-band, acoustic perturbation. Our results show that adult bats can not only modify distinct parameters of their vocalizations, but that these changes persist even after noise cessation - in some cases lasting severa

SUBMITTER: Genzel D 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6662767 | biostudies-literature | 2019 Jul

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature