The cost of living in larger primate groups includes higher fly densities.
Ontology highlight
ABSTRACT:
SUBMITTER: Gogarten JF
PROVIDER: S-EPMC9166189 | biostudies-literature |
REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature
Similar Datasets
Project description:Kibale fly-primate associations
| PRJEB49652 | ENA
Project description:Kibale fly-primate associations
| PRJEB49650 | ENA
Project description:Since the work of Tower in the 1950s, we have come to expect lower neuron density in the cerebral cortex of larger brains. We studied dolphin brains varying from 783 to 6215g. As expected, average neuron density in four areas of cortex decreased from the smallest to the largest brain. Despite having a lower neuron density than smaller dolphins, the killer whale has more gray matter and more cortical neurons than any mammal, including humans. To begin a study of non-dolphin toothed whales, we measured a 596g brain of a pygmy sperm whale and a 2004g brain of a Cuvier's beaked whale. We compared neuron density of Nissl stained cortex of these two brains with those of the dolphins. Non-dolphin brains had lower neuron densities compared to all of the dolphins, even the 6215g brain. The beaked whale and pygmy sperm whale we studied dive deeper and for much longer periods than the dolphins. For example, the beaked whale may dive for more than an hour, and the pygmy sperm whale more than a half hour. In contrast, the dolphins we studied limit dives to five or 10 minutes. Brain metabolism may be one feature limiting dolphin dives. The brain consumes an oversized share of oxygen available to the body. The most oxygen is used by the cortex and cerebellar gray matter. The dolphins have larger brains, larger cerebellums, and greater numbers of cortex neurons than would be expected given their body size. Smaller brains, smaller cerebellums and fewer cortical neurons potentially allow the beaked whale and pygmy sperm whale to dive longer and deeper than the dolphins. Although more gray matter, more neurons, and a larger cerebellum may limit dolphins to shorter, shallower dives, these features must give them some advantage. For example, they may be able to catch more elusive individual high-calorie prey in the upper ocean.
| S-EPMC6914331 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Do large mammals evolve faster than small mammals or vice versa? Because the answer to this question contributes to our understanding of how life-history affects long-term and large-scale evolutionary patterns, and how microevolutionary rates scale-up to macroevolutionary rates, it has received much attention. A satisfactory or consistent answer to this question is lacking, however. Here, we take a fresh look at this problem using a large fossil dataset of mammals from the Neogene of the Old World (NOW). Controlling for sampling biases, calculating per capita origination and extinction rates of boundary-crossers and estimating survival probabilities using capture-mark-recapture (CMR) methods, we found the recurring pattern that large mammal genera and species have higher origination and extinction rates, and therefore shorter durations. This pattern is surprising in the light of molecular studies, which show that smaller animals, with their shorter generation times and higher metabolic rates, have greater absolute rates of evolution. However, higher molecular rates do not necessarily translate to higher taxon rates because both the biotic and physical environments interact with phenotypic variation, in part fueled by mutations, to affect origination and extinction rates. To explain the observed pattern, we propose that the ability to evolve and maintain behavior such as hibernation, torpor and burrowing, collectively termed "sleep-or-hide" (SLOH) behavior, serves as a means of environmental buffering during expected and unexpected environmental change. SLOH behavior is more common in some small mammals, and, as a result, SLOH small mammals contribute to higher average survivorship and lower origination probabilities among small mammals.
| S-EPMC2329699 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Recent research has cast doubt on the reliability of bones and teeth for reconstructing phylogenetic relationships among higher primate species and genera. Herein, we investigate whether this problem is confined to hard tissues by examining the utility of higher primate soft-tissue characters for reconstructing phylogenetic relationships at low taxonomic levels. We use cladistic methods to analyze 197 soft-tissue characters for the extant hominoids and then compare the resulting phylogenetic hypotheses with the group's consensus molecular phylogeny, which is widely considered to be accurate. We show that the soft-tissue characters yield robust phylogenetic hypotheses that are compatible with the molecular phylogeny. Given the strength of the evidence for molecular phylogeny, these results indicate that, unlike craniodental hard-tissue characters, soft tissues are reliable for reconstructing phylogenetic relationships among higher primate species and genera. Thus, in higher primates at least, some types of morphological data are more useful than others for phylogeny reconstruction.
| S-EPMC27160 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Power of the crowd: substrate-dependent impact of black soldier fly larvae on bacterial community composition in substrate and larval gut
| PRJEB40667 | ENA
Project description:In higher-order motion stimuli, the direction of object motion does not follow the direction of luminance change. Such stimuli could be generated by the wing movements of a flying butterfly and further complicated by its motion in and out of shadows. Human subjects readily perceive the direction of higher-order motion, although this stands in stark contrast to prevailing motion vision models. Flies and humans compute motion in similar ways, and because flies behaviorally track bars containing higher-order motion cues, they become an attractive model system for investigating the neurophysiology underlying higher-order motion sensitivity. We here use intracellular electrophysiology of motion-vision-sensitive neurons in the hoverfly lobula plate to quantify responses to stimuli containing higher-order motion. We show that motion sensitivity can be broken down into two separate streams, directionally coding for elementary motion and figure motion, respectively, and that responses to Fourier and theta motion can be predicted from these. The sensitivity is affected both by the stimulus' time course and by the neuron's underlying receptive field. Responses to preferred-direction theta motion are sexually dimorphic and particularly robust along the visual midline.
| S-EPMC3365167 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Most animals need to spend time being vigilant for predators, at the expense of other activities such as foraging. Group-living animals can benefit from the shared vigilance effort of other group members, with individuals reducing personal vigilance effort as group size increases. Behaviors like active scanning or head lifting are usually used to quantify vigilance but may not be accurate measures of this. We suggest that measuring an animal's blinking rate gives a meaningful measure of vigilance: increased blinking implies reduced vigilance, as the animal cannot detect predators when its eyes are closed. We describe an observational study of a captive population of red deer, where we measured the blinking rates of individual deer from groups of differing sizes (where mean group size ranged between 1 and 42.7 individuals). We demonstrate that as group size increases in red deer, individuals increase their blink rate, confirming the prediction that vigilance should decrease. Blinking is a simple non-invasive measure and offers a useful metric for assessing the welfare of animals experiencing an increase in perceived predation risk or other stressors.
| S-EPMC10015368 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Group living commonly helps organisms face challenging environmental conditions. Although a known phenomenon in humans, recent findings suggest that a benefit of group living in animals generally might be increased innovative problem-solving efficiency. This benefit has never been demonstrated in a natural context, however, and the mechanisms underlying improved efficiency are largely unknown. We examined the problem-solving performance of great and blue tits at automated devices and found that efficiency increased with flock size. This relationship held when restricting the analysis to naive individuals, demonstrating that larger groups increased innovation efficiency. In addition to this effect of naive flock size, the presence of at least one experienced bird increased the frequency of solving, and larger flocks were more likely to contain experienced birds. These findings provide empirical evidence for the "pool of competence" hypothesis in nonhuman animals. The probability of success also differed consistently between individuals, a necessary condition for the pool of competence hypothesis. Solvers had a higher probability of success when foraging with a larger number of companions and when using devices located near rather than further from protective tree cover, suggesting a role for reduced predation risk on problem-solving efficiency. In contrast to traditional group living theory, individuals joining larger flocks benefited from a higher seed intake, suggesting that group living facilitated exploitation of a novel food source through improved problem-solving efficiency. Together our results suggest that both ecological and social factors, through reduced predation risk and increased pool of competence, mediate innovation in natural populations.
| S-EPMC3179046 | biostudies-literature
Project description:RNA has the intrinsic property to base pair, forming complex structures fundamental to its diverse functions. Here we develop PARIS, a method based on reversible psoralen-crosslinking for global mapping of RNA duplexes with near base-pair resolution in living cells. PARIS analysis in three human and mouse cell types reveals frequent long-range structures, higher order architectures, and RNA:RNA interactions in trans across the transcriptome. PARIS determines base-pairing interactions on an individual-molecule level, revealing pervasive alternative conformations. We used PARIS-determined helices to guide phylogenetic analysis of RNA structures, and discovered conserved long-range and alternative structures. XIST, a lncRNA essential for X chromosome inactivation, folds into evolutionarily conserved RNA structural domains that span many kilobases. XIST A-repeat forms complex inter-repeat duplexes that nucleate higher order assembly of the key epigenetic silencing protein SPEN. PARIS is a generally applicable and versatile method that provides novel insights into the RNA structurome and interactome. Cells are crosslinked with AMT and RNA is extracted from cells by RNase digestion. Crosslinked RNA fragments are selected from total RNA by 2D gel electrophoresis. Purified crosslinked RNA duplexes are proximity ligated and crosslinking is reversed. Then the chimeric RNA molecules are converted into cDNA libraries for high-throughput sequencing.
2016-04-04 | E-GEOD-74353 | biostudies-arrayexpress