Stability and manoeuvrability in animal movement: lessons from biology, modelling and robotics
Published in Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences
Large mesopelagic fish biomass in the Southern Ocean resolved by acoustic properties
Published in Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences
The oceanic mesopelagic zone, 200–1000 m below sea level, holds abundant small fishes that play central roles in ecosystem function. Global mesopelagic fish biomass estimates are increasingly derived using active acoustics, where echosounder-generated signals are emitted, reflected by pelagic organisms and detected by transducers on vessels. Previo...
Beaked whales and state-dependent decision-making: how does body condition affect the trade-off between foraging and pre...
Published in Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences
Body condition is central to how animals balance foraging with predator avoidance—a trade-off that fundamentally affects animal fitness. Animals in poor condition may accept greater predation risk to satisfy current foraging ‘needs’, while those in good condition may be more risk averse to protect future ‘assets’. These state-dependent behavioural ...
Genetic coupling of life-history and aerobic performance in Atlantic salmon
Published in Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences
A better understanding of the genetic and phenotypic architecture underlying life-history variation is a longstanding aim in biology. Theories suggest energy metabolism determines life-history variation by modulating resource acquisition and allocation trade-offs, but the genetic underpinnings of the relationship and its dependence on ecological co...
Colour constancy failures expected in colourful environments
Published in Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences
Colour constancy refers to the constant perceived or apparent colour of a surface despite changes in illumination spectrum. Laboratory measurements have often found it imperfect. The aim here was to estimate the frequency of constancy failures in natural outdoor environments and relate them to colorimetric surface properties. A computational analys...
Rotation of skylight polarization during learning walks is necessary to trigger neuronal plasticity in Cataglyphis ants
Published in Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences
Many animals use celestial cues for impressive navigational performances in challenging habitats. Since the position of the sun and associated skylight cues change throughout the day and season, it is crucial to correct for these changes. Cataglyphis desert ants possess a time-compensated skylight compass allowing them to navigate back to their nes...
Evolution of flexible biting in hyperdiverse parasitoid wasps
...Published in Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences
One key event in insect evolution was the development of mandibles with two joints, which allowed powerful biting but restricted their movement to a single degree of freedom. These mandibles define the Dicondylia, which constitute over 99% of all extant insect species. It was common doctrine that the dicondylic articulation of chewing mandibles rem...
Hybridization boosts dispersal of two contrasted ecotypes in a grass species
...Published in Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences
Genetic exchanges between closely related groups of organisms with different adaptations have well-documented beneficial and detrimental consequences. In plants, pollen-mediated exchanges affect the sorting of alleles across physical landscapes and influence rates of hybridization. How these dynamics affect the emergence and spread of novel phenoty...
An unbiased test reveals no enrichment of sexually antagonistic polymorphisms on the human X chromosome
Published in Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences
Mutations with beneficial effects in one sex can have deleterious effects in the other. Such ‘sexually antagonistic’ (SA) variants contribute to variation in life-history traits and overall fitness, yet their genomic distribution is poorly resolved. Theory predicts that SA variants could be enriched on the X chromosome or autosomes, yet current emp...
Socio-cultural similarity with host population rather than ecological similarity predicts success and failure of human m...
Published in Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences
Demographers argue that human migration patterns are shaped by people moving to better environments. More recently, however, evolutionary theorists have argued that people move to similar environments to which they are culturally adapted. While previous studies analysing which factors affect migration patterns have focused almost exclusively on suc...
