Correction to 'Intra-ejaculate sperm selection in female zebra finches'.
Published in Biology letters
Developmental experience with anthropogenic noise hinders adult mate location in an acoustically signalling invertebrate...
Published in Biology letters
Phenotypic plasticity facilitates survival and reproduction in rapidly changing and novel environments. Traffic noise spectrally overlaps with (i.e. masks) the sounds used by many acoustically signalling organisms to locate and secure mates. To determine if pre-reproductive exposure to noise improves adult performance in noisy environments, we rear...
Narrow anthropogenic corridors direct the movement of a generalist boreal butterfly.
Published in Biology letters
Ecological and anthropogenic corridors are becoming more common worldwide, but little is known about how corridor size (width) affects species' movements, and thus their effects. Here we investigated whether 4- and 8-m wide anthropogenic corridors (seismic lines) cleared for petroleum (oil sands) exploration in boreal forests in Alberta, Canada, ac...
Local extinction of the Asian tiger mosquito (Aedes albopictus) following rat eradication on Palmyra Atoll.
...Published in Biology letters
The Asian tiger mosquito, Aedes albopictus, appears to have been extirpated from Palmyra Atoll following rat eradication. Anecdotal biting reports, collection records, and regular captures in black-light traps showed the species was present before rat eradication. Since then, there have been no biting reports and no captures over 2 years of extensi...
Understanding the evolution of personality requires the study of mechanisms behind the development and life history of p...
Published in Biology letters
Research on animal personality explains the coexistence of distinct behavioural phenotypes within a species and demonstrates limits to individual plasticity. However, the mechanisms guiding the lifelong development of personality should receive more attention, because many elements of personality are emergent properties of interactions between the ...
State-dependent judgement bias in Drosophila: evidence for evolutionarily primitive affective processes.
Published in Biology letters
Affective states influence decision-making under ambiguity in humans and other animals. Individuals in a negative state tend to interpret ambiguous cues more negatively than individuals in a positive state. We demonstrate that the fruit fly, Drosophila melanogaster, also exhibits state-dependent changes in cue interpretation. Drosophila were traine...
Bone resorption: supporting immunometabolism.
Published in Biology letters
Activation of the immune system is associated with an increase in the breakdown of various peripheral tissues, including bone. Despite the widely appreciated role of inflammatory mediators in promoting bone resorption, the functional value behind this process is not completely understood. Recent advances in the field of immunometabolism have highli...
The effect of dispersal on rates of cumulative cultural evolution.
Published in Biology letters
The ability to develop cultural adaptations to local environments is critical to the biological success of humans. Although overall population size and connectedness are thought to play an important role in increasing the rate of cumulative cultural evolution, the independent effect of dispersal rules on rates of cultural evolution has not been exa...
First detection of bee viruses in hoverfly (syrphid) pollinators.
Published in Biology letters
Global declines of insect pollinators jeopardize the delivery of pollination services in both agricultural and natural ecosystems. The importance of infectious diseases has been documented in honeybees, but there is little information on the extent to which these diseases are shared with other pollinator orders. Here, we establish for the first tim...
Weapon damage is associated with contest dynamics but not mating success in fallow deer (Dama dama).
Published in Biology letters
Antlers function as primary weapons during fights for many species of ungulate. We examined the association between antler damage and (i) contest dynamics: the behavioural tactics used during fighting including fight duration, and (ii) mating success, fighting rate and dominance. Structural damage of the antlers was associated with contest dynamics...
