Preprints

Filtering by Subject: Integrative Biology

Ecogeography of group size suggests differences in drivers of sociality among cooperatively breeding fairywrens

Allison E. Johnson, Joseph F. Welklin, Ian R. Hoppe, et al.

Published: 2022-01-05
Subjects: Behavior and Ethology, Biology, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Evolution, Integrative Biology, Life Sciences

Cooperatively breeding species exhibit a range of social behaviors associated with different costs and benefits to group-living, often in association with different environmental conditions. For example, species in which collective-care of offspring reduces the cost of reproduction are more common in harsh environments (true cooperative breeding), while species that collectively defend resources [...]

Bothersome burrowers: tracking gopher (Thomomys bottae) time-averaging in a late-Holocene site in California

Maria Viteri, Elizabeth Hadly

Published: 2021-12-04
Subjects: Biology, Integrative Biology, Life Sciences

Understanding the taphonomic biases affecting fossil deposits is necessary in order to extract their true ecological signals. In terrestrial sites, the mixing of fossil material by mammalian bioturbators can substantially increase time-averaging, obscuring or even erasing stratification. In particular, pocket gophers (Thomomys sp.) are known to burrow in Holocene sites and thereby complicate the [...]

Mitochondria as the powerhouses of sexual selection: testing mechanistic links between development, cellular respiration, and bird song

Ondi L. Crino, Steph Falk, Andrew Katsis, et al.

Published: 2021-12-03
Subjects: Biology, Integrative Biology, Life Sciences

Although the influence of developmental conditions on the expression of sexually selected traits is established, the physiological mechanisms that modulate such effects remain a matter of intense debate. Here, we test the role of the developmental environment in shaping adult mitochondrial function and link mitochondrial function to expression of a sexually selected trait in males (bird song). We [...]

The role of sexual isolation during rapid ecological divergence: evidence for a new dimension of isolation in Rhagoletis pomonella

Alycia Lackey, Alyssa Murray, Nadia Mirza, et al.

Published: 2021-11-16
Subjects: Biology, Integrative Biology, Life Sciences

The pace of divergence and likelihood of complete speciation may depend how and when different types of reproductive barriers evolve. After initial reproductive barriers evolve, questions remain about how subsequently evolving barriers may facilitate additional divergence and potential speciation. We tested for the presence of sexual isolation (reduced mating between populations due to divergent [...]

Functions for simulating data and designing studies of physiological flexibility in the acute glucocorticoid response to stressors.

Conor Taff

Published: 2021-09-15
Subjects: Biology, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Endocrinology, Integrative Biology, Life Sciences, Physiology

Wild animals often experience unpredictable challenges that demand rapid and flexible responses. The glucocorticoid mediated stress response is one of the major systems that allows vertebrates to rapidly adjust their physiology and behavior. Given its role in responding to challenges, evolutionary physiologists have focused on the consequences of between-individual and, more recently, [...]

Unreciprocated allogrooming hierarchies in a population of wild group-living mammals

Catherine E Nadin, David W. Macdonald, Sandra Baker, et al.

Published: 2021-08-06
Subjects: Biology, Integrative Biology, Life Sciences

Allogrooming can relate to social status in mammalian societies, and thus, be used to infer social structure. This relationship has previously been investigated by examining an individual’s dominance rank and their total amount of allogrooming. This, however, does not account for the identity of allogrooming partners. We applied a novel approach, calculating the linearity and steepness of [...]

Day and night camera trap video is effective for identifying wild Asian elephants

Sasha Montero-De La Torre, Sarah L Jacobson, Marnoch Yindee, et al.

Published: 2021-07-24
Subjects: Biodiversity, Biology, Comparative Psychology, Integrative Biology, Life Sciences, Psychology, Social and Behavioral Sciences

Camera traps provide a virtual window into the natural world of wild animals, as they provide a noninvasive way to capture anatomical and behavioral information. Regular monitoring of wild populations through the collection of behavioral and demographic data is critical for the conservation of endangered species like the Asian elephant (Elephas maximus). Identifying individual elephants can [...]

Quantifying the dynamics of nearly 100 years of dominance hierarchy research

Elizabeth A. Hobson

Published: 2021-07-19
Subjects: Biology, Integrative Biology, Life Sciences

Dominance hierarchies have been studied for almost 100 years. A science of science approach can help provide high-level insight into how the dynamics of dominance hierarchy research have shifted or been maintained over this long timescale. To summarize these general patterns, I extracted publication metadata using a Google Scholar search of "dominance hierarchy, resulting in over 26,000 [...]

The ecology of wealth inequality in animal societies

Eli Strauss, Daizaburo Shizuka

Published: 2021-07-14
Subjects: Behavior and Ethology, Biology, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Evolution, Integrative Biology, Life Sciences

Individuals vary in their access to resources, social connections, and phenotypic traits, and a central goal of evolutionary biology is to understand how this variation arises and influences fitness. Parallel research on humans has focused on the causes and consequences of variation in material possessions, opportunity, and health. Central to both fields of study is that unequal distribution of [...]

Explaining preemptive acclimation by linking information to plant phenotype

Pedro José Aphalo, Víctor O. Sadras

Published: 2021-07-07
Subjects: Agriculture, Biology, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Integrative Biology, Life Sciences

We review mechanisms for preemptive acclimation in plants and propose a conceptual model linking developmental and evolutionary ecology with the acquisition of information through sensing of cues and signals. The idea is that plants acquire much of the information in the environment not from individual cues and signals but instead from their joint multivariate properties such as correlations. If [...]

The dynamics of dominance: open questions, challenges, and solutions

Eli Strauss, Daizaburo Shizuka

Published: 2021-07-01
Subjects: Biology, Integrative Biology, Life Sciences

Although social hierarchies are recognized as dynamic systems, they are typically treated as static entities for practical reasons. Here, we ask what we can learn from a dynamical view of dominance, and provide a research agenda for the next decades. We identify five broad questions at the individual, dyadic, and group levels, exploring the causes and consequences of individual changes in rank, [...]

On the Multifunctionality of Feathers and the Evolution of BIrds

Ryan S Terrill, Allison J. Shultz

Published: 2021-05-27
Subjects: Biology, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Evolution, Integrative Biology, Life Sciences

Abstract The ability feathers have to perform many functions simultaneously and at different times is integral to the evolutionary history of all birds. Many studies focus on single functions of feathers; but any given feather performs many functions over its lifetime. Here, we review the known functions of feathers and discuss the interactions of these functions with avian evolution. Recent [...]

Effects of wave-driven water flow on the fast-start escape response of juvenile coral reef damselfishes

Dominique Roche

Published: 2021-03-25
Subjects: Behavior and Ethology, Biology, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Integrative Biology, Life Sciences

Fish often evade predators with a fast-start escape response. Studies typically examine this behaviour in still water despite water motion being an inherent feature of aquatic ecosystems. In shallow habitats, waves create complex flows that likely influence escape performance, particularly in small fishes with low absolute swimming speeds relative to environmental flows. I examined how [...]

Guidelines for reporting methods to estimate metabolic rates by aquatic intermittent-flow respirometry

Shaun S Killen, Emil Christensen, Daphne Cortese, et al.

Published: 2021-02-22
Subjects: Biology, Integrative Biology, Life Sciences

Interest in the measurement of metabolic rates is growing rapidly, due to the relevance of metabolism in understanding organismal physiology, behaviour, evolution and responses to environmental change. The study of metabolism in aquatic animals is undergoing an especially pronounced expansion, with more researchers utilising intermittent-flow respirometry as a research tool than ever before. [...]

Ecological Countermeasures for Pandemic Prevention: When Ecological Restoration is a Human Health Imperative

Jamie Reaser, Arne Witt, Gary M. Tabor, et al.

Published: 2020-12-05
Subjects: Animal Sciences, Bacteriology, Biodiversity, Biology, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Environmental Microbiology and Microbial Ecology Life Sciences, Environmental Public Health, Epidemiology, Immunity, Immunology and Infectious Disease, Immunology of Infectious Disease, Immunopathology, Integrative Biology, International Public Health, Life Sciences, Medicine and Health Sciences, Microbiology, Parasitology, Pathogenic Microbiology, Population Biology, Public Health, Systems Biology, Terrestrial and Aquatic Ecology, Veterinary Infectious Diseases, Veterinary Medicine, Veterinary Microbiology and Immunobiology, Veterinary Pathology and Pathobiology, Zoology

Ecological restoration should be regarded as a public health service. Unfortunately, the lack of quantitative linkages between environmental and human health has limited recognition of these principle. Advent of COVID-19 pandemic provides the impetus for the further discussion. We propose ecological countermeasures as highly targeted, landscape-based interventions to arrest the drivers of land [...]

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