(Press-News.org) Monash University researchers have discovered that male Australian desert goby fish are surprisingly strategic when it comes to courtship, adapting their tactics depending on the frequency of their contact with females.
Attracting females involves significant time, energy and exposure to predation and previous research has indicated that male gobies are more likely to court larger females due to the number of eggs they carry compared with their smaller counterparts.
However, new research, published in the journal Behavioral Ecology and Sociobiology, indicates that should the male fish find himself infrequently in contact with females, he will pursue any he finds with zeal, regardless of size.
Doctors Andreas Svensson, Topi Lehtonen and Bob Wong expanded on their previous research by procuring goby fish from Central Australia and monitoring their behaviour under controlled conditions in a laboratory.
Dr Bob Wong, a Senior Lecturer in the Science Faculty at Monash University, said the research showed that when males encountered females more frequently, the males were far more discriminating about how much effort they put into courting larger females over others.
"By contrast, males will court females vigorously irrespective of her attractiveness if passing females are few and far between," Dr Wong said.
Native to the springs and waterholes of the arid regions surrounding Lake Eyre, the desert goby is an unusual species.
Dr Wong said the male goby fish establish nests under rocks, try to attract passing females using colourful courtship displays and ultimately become the sole guardians of the eggs.
"Given this heavy investment in reproduction, males attempt to maximise their returns through higher egg yields," Dr Wong said.
"These findings are important because, for a long time, females were typically regarded as the more discerning sex when it comes to choosing a potential mate. Here, we show that males, too, can be highly picky and are much more tactical in whom they choose to court," Dr Wong said.
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ST. PAUL, Minn. – Contrary to earlier research, a new, long-term study suggests that cholesterol level in mid-life may not be linked to later development of Alzheimer's disease, according to a study published in the November 10, 2010, online issue of Neurology®, the medical journal of the American Academy of Neurology. However, the results suggest that large decreases in cholesterol levels in old age could be a better predictor of developing the memory-robbing disease.
"While some studies suggest that cholesterol is a risk factor for dementia, others have not replicated ...
High cholesterol levels in middle age do not appear to increase women's risk of developing Alzheimer's disease and other forms of dementia later in life, new Johns Hopkins-led research finds, despite a body of scientific evidence long suggesting a link between the two.
What the study, published online in the journal Neurology, does find is that women whose cholesterol levels decline from middle age to old age are at 2.5 times greater risk of developing the memory-wasting diseases than those whose cholesterol stayed the same or increased over the years.
"Our research ...
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Gout is a common and very painful inflammatory arthritis. "The increasing disease ...
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An initiative of the Consultative ...
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"This is the first definitive ...
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In 1999, Baylor College of Medicine (www.bcm.edu) researcher Dr. Huda Zoghbi (http://www.bcm.edu/genetics/index.cfm?pmid=11053), and her colleagues identified mutations in one of these genes called MECP2 as the culprit in a devastating neurological disorder called Rett syndrome (http://www.nichd.nih.gov/health/topics/rett_syndrome.cfm). ...
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The computer game Tetris may have a special ability to reduce flashbacks after viewing traumatic images not shared by other types of computer game, Oxford University scientists have discovered in a series of experiments.
In earlier laboratory work the Oxford team showed that playing Tetris after traumatic events could reduce memory flashbacks in healthy volunteers. These are a laboratory model of the types of intrusive memories associated with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).
In this new experimental study, the researchers compared the effectiveness of Tetris ...
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To determine whether prostate cancer patients taking ...
