Zoology articles within Nature Communications

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  • Article
    | Open Access

    Some atmospheric pollutants may disrupt chemical communication in insects. Here, the authors show that exposure to elevated ozone disrupts pheromone-mediated mate recognition and increases hybridization in laboratory colonies of four Drosophila species.

    • Nan-Ji Jiang
    • , Xinqi Dong
    •  & Markus Knaden

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Bergmann’s Rule predicts larger body sizes in colder climates. Here, the authors examine extinct and extant dinosaurs (birds) and mammaliaforms, finding no evidence of body size variation with latitude in any group, but a small variation with temperature in extant birds.

    • Lauren N. Wilson
    • , Jacob D. Gardner
    •  & Chris L. Organ

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The narrative that larger males are the norm in mammals has predominated for over a century. An analysis of body mass dimorphism across mammals, sampling families by their species richness, indicates that males are not larger than females in most mammals and that monomorphism is almost as prevalent.

    • Kaia J. Tombak
    • , Severine B. S. W. Hex
    •  & Daniel I. Rubenstein

  • Article
    | Open Access

    How fast can animals run? Here, the authors show that maximum running speed is limited by different musculoskeletal constraints across animal size: kinetic energy capacity in small animals, and work capacity in large animals.

    • David Labonte
    • , Peter J. Bishop
    •  & Christofer J. Clemente

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Criteria for evaluating joint articulation in vertebrates are lacking. Here, the authors propose an approach for combining measurements of 3D articular overlap, symmetry, and congruence into a single metric, and apply this to examine the walking stride of Deinonychus antirrhopus.

    • Armita R. Manafzadeh
    • , Stephen M. Gatesy
    •  & Bhart-Anjan S. Bhullar

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The fruit fly Drosophila melanogaster has emerged as a model to characterize the mechanisms of tumor-induced host organ dysfunction. Here, Xu, Liu et al. describe a mechanism of tumor-induced kidney dysfunction through hyper-activation of the PvR/JNK/Jra pathway in the Principal cells of the fly kidney/Malpighian tubules.

    • Jun Xu
    • , Ying Liu
    •  & Norbert Perrimon

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Yellow fever is a public health threat in the Americas but has not recently been reported in the Caribbean despite presence of the mosquito vector Aedes aegypti. Here, the authors show through experimental infection that populations of Aedes aegypti from the Caribbean and surrounding areas are competent of yellow fever transmission.

    • Gaelle Gabiane
    • , Chloé Bohers
    •  & Anna-Bella Failloux

  • Article
    | Open Access

    It is unclear why flying insects congregate around artificial light sources. Here, the authors use high-speed videography and motion-capture, finding that insects fly perpendicular to light sources due to a disruption of the dorsal light response.

    • Samuel T. Fabian
    • , Yash Sondhi
    •  & Huai-Ti Lin

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Varroa and Tropilaelaps mites threaten honeybee health. This study finds that mites alter feeding habits depends on their own, and hosts’, life history stage. Mites feed on the host hemolymph when parasitizing pupae during their reproductive stage but consume fat body during their dispersal stage.

    • Bin Han
    • , Jiangli Wu
    •  & Shufa Xu

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Interactions with angiosperms are thought to have had a significant impact on insect diversification. Here, the authors use a Bayesian process-based approach to find that angiosperm radiation played a dual role that changed through time, mitigating insect extinction in the Cretaceous and promoting insect origination in the Cenozoic.

    • David Peris
    •  & Fabien L. Condamine

  • Article
    | Open Access

    A key assumption of ageing research is that old males are less fertile. A meta-analysis of ejaculate traits challenges this, by showing senescence is not consistently observed across 157 species of animals, but is specific to only certain taxa and ejaculate traits. The study also highlights methodological factors that might modulate the evidence for reproductive senescence.

    • Krish Sanghvi
    • , Regina Vega-Trejo
    •  & Irem Sepil

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The evolution of cicadas is unclear due to a lack of understanding of transitional features. Here, the authors assess adult and nymph mid-Cretaceous cicadas, to elucidate their morphological evolution and identify evidence of the origins of cicada sound-generation and subterranean lifestyle.

    • Hui Jiang
    • , Jacek Szwedo
    •  & Bo Wang

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Although intraspecific dominance hierarchies are common, large scale interspecific dominance hierarchies are unknown. Using data from hundreds of avian species, the authors find that species that are more familiar with each other engage in less aggression and the aggression is resolved more directly.

    • Gavin M. Leighton
    • , Jonathan P. Drury
    •  & Eliot T. Miller

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Aedes aegypti transmit several arboviruses and control of the mosquito populations could be beneficial. Here the authors show that deletion of leucine aminopeptidase1 (LAP1) results in mitochondrial defects and abnormal autophagy in sperm, reducing fertility and fecundity of females. LAP1−/− males show no obvious defects in longevity and mating fitness.

    • Xiaomei Sun
    • , Xueli Wang
    •  & Zhen Zou

  • Article
    | Open Access

    A plant virus induces and hijacks vitellogenin (Vg) of insect vector into virus-induced exosomes for release together from salivary glands to plant phloem, where the Vg suppresses H2O2 burst, facilitating insect feeding and viral transmission.

    • Yanfei Wang
    • , Chengcong Lu
    •  & Qian Chen

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Body colour may be an important factor in insect phenology. Here, the authors show that colour lightness of dragonfly assemblages from the UK, collected between May and October from 1990-2020, varies in response to seasonal changes in solar radiation, suggesting a link between colour-based thermoregulation and insect phenology.

    • Roberto Novella-Fernandez
    • , Roland Brandl
    •  & Christian Hof

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Control of sound production by fast vocal muscle is critical to vocal communication. Here the authors show that zebra finches need daily singing exercise to build and maintain peak vocal muscle performance. Lack of exercise alters vocal muscle physiology and reduces attractiveness to females.

    • Iris Adam
    • , Katharina Riebel
    •  & Coen P. H. Elemans

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Here, by characterizing 477 genomes from cultivated bacteria and metagenome-assembled genomes of the bee gut microbiota, the authors uncover uncharacterized biosynthetic gene clusters encoding small molecules with potential antimicrobial activity against bee pathogens, shedding light on the role of microbiome in honeybee health.

    • Haoyu Lang
    • , Yuwen Liu
    •  & Hao Zheng

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Elasmobranchs (sharks, rays and skates) are among the most threatened marine vertebrates, yet their global functional diversity remains largely unknown. This study uses a trait dataset of over 1,000 species to assess elasmobranch functional diversity and compare it against other previously studied biodiversity facets to identify global conservation priorities.

    • Catalina Pimiento
    • , Camille Albouy
    •  & Fabien Leprieur

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The origin and early evolution of large scales in bony fishes and small scales in cartilaginous fishes are unclear. Here, the authors report a 425-million-year-old fish, Entelognathus, with a mosaic of scale and fin spine characters.

    • Xindong Cui
    • , Matt Friedman
    •  & Min Zhu

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The contribution of adaptive radiation to species and phenotypic diversity within major clades is not clear. Here, the authors use morphological and phylogenetic data for 1226 species of frogs, finding that less than half of families resemble adaptive radiation, but that adaptive radiation contributed to 75% of diversity.

    • Gen Morinaga
    • , John J. Wiens
    •  & Daniel S. Moen

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Parental care in birds includes diverse behaviours but the variation in care from each parent across the breeding cycle and between species is unclear. Here, the authors study 1533 bird species, finding different patterns across breeding stages, and that species with strong sexual selection or paternity uncertainty tend to show female-biased care.

    • Daiping Wang
    • , Wenyuan Zhang
    •  & Xiang-Yi Li Richter

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Here, the authors report two fossil lampreys, jawless vertebrates, from the Middle-Late Jurassic fossil Lagerstätte Yanliao Biota of North China. These large lampreys have an extensively toothed feeding apparatus resembling the Southern Hemisphere pouched lamprey, suggesting an ancestral predatory habit and southern origin of living lampreys.

    • Feixiang Wu
    • , Philippe Janvier
    •  & Chi Zhang

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Cost-effective biodiversity monitoring through time is important for evidence-based conservation. Here, the authors show that automated bioacoustics monitoring can be used to track tropical forest recovery from agricultural abandonment, suggesting its use to assess restoration outcomes.

    • Jörg Müller
    • , Oliver Mitesser
    •  & Zuzana Buřivalová

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Despite the significance of mosquitos for human health, little research has focused on their phylogeny. Here, the authors present a resolved phylogenetic history of mosquitoes based on phylogenomics showing that these major disease vectors radiated coincidentally with geologic events and the diversification of their hosts.

    • John Soghigian
    • , Charles Sither
    •  & Brian M. Wiegmann

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Corral-Lopez et al. use guppies as a model system for the evolution of collective motion. They show that guppies artificially selected for schooling remain highly coordinated across predation contexts and show key changes in brain morphology that likely increase the efficiency of sensory information relay.

    • Alberto Corral-Lopez
    • , Alexander Kotrschal
    •  & Niclas Kolm

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Neural coding of goal direction remains unclear in insects. Here, the authors describe goal-direction neurons in the monarch butterfly brain that specifically encode the insect’s desired flight direction during spatial orientation.

    • M. Jerome Beetz
    • , Christian Kraus
    •  & Basil el Jundi

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Yaks have been subject to natural selection, human domestication and interspecific introgression during their evolution. Here, the authors have identified genomic structural variations and the linked genes involved in these processes in domestic yaks, to reveal new insight into genetic basis of phenotypic diversity.

    • Xinfeng Liu
    • , Wenyu Liu
    •  & Jianquan Liu

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Individuals may benefit from adjusting their social relationships strategically in response to changing conditions, but evidence in wild animals is limited. Using an automated field experiment, the authors show that wild jackdaws learn to modify their social interactions to maximise foraging rewards, while retaining valuable long-term relationships.

    • Michael Kings
    • , Josh J. Arbon
    •  & Alex Thornton

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Mechanisms by which aquatic animals optimize their tailbeat frequency for swimming have not been fully explained. Here, the authors propose scaling laws for undulatory swimmers, relating beat frequency to length considering muscle biology and fluid interaction.

    • Jesús Sánchez-Rodríguez
    • , Christophe Raufaste
    •  & Médéric Argentina

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Brachiopod-bivalve switch in diversity dominance after the Palaeozoic era is a textbook example of clade replacement, and its mechanism has long been debated. Here, new Bayesian analyses suggest that diversification turnover between the two was not driven by biotic competition but the end-Permian extinction.

    • Zhen Guo
    • , Joseph T. Flannery-Sutherland
    •  & Zhong-Qiang Chen

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Workers in social insects such as honey bees, bumble bees, and ants are expected to spend their lives helping their mother reproduce. Here the authors show that workers of several bumble bee species can in fact mate and lead colonies of their own.

    • Mingsheng Zhuang
    • , Thomas J. Colgan
    •  & Jilian Li

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Mucus are ubiquitous natural materials, but little is known about their structures or properties. Here, the authors identify the components of three functional mucus from snails, which are the focus of a rapidly growing number of biomedical and cosmetic applications.

    • Antonio R. Cerullo
    • , Maxwell B. McDermott
    •  & Adam B. Braunschweig

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Behaviour drives infection risk in social groups. Here, Li et al. show that depending on the behavioural role of clonal ants in a colony, genetically identical individuals face vastly different risks of becoming infected with parasitic nematodes.

    • Zimai Li
    • , Bhoomika Bhat
    •  & Yuko Ulrich

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Insecticide resistance in mosquitoes threatens the success of malaria control programmes. This study found that in different populations of a malaria mosquito species in West Africa, resistance is associated with different genes or different mutations in the same set of genes.

    • Eric R. Lucas
    • , Sanjay C. Nagi
    •  & David Weetman

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