sexual selection
- Convergent evolution of super black plumage near bright color in 15 bird families
Summary: Birds independently evolved super black (broadband, low-reflectance) plumage next to bright colors in 15 different families; this may be a sexually selected optical illusion to make nearby colors appear brighter.
- Elevated oxidative stress in pied flycatcher nestlings of eumelanic foster fathers under low rearing temperatures
Summary: The pied flycatcher demonstrates a temperature-dependent association between oxidative stress of offspring and variation in the melanin coloration of their foster father.
- Income and capital breeding in males: energetic and physiological limitations on male mating strategies
Summary: Capital- and income-breeding strategies can be applied to males, but factors shaping these strategies are different from those found in females.
- Dietary canthaxanthin reduces xanthophyll uptake and red coloration in adult red-legged partridges
Summary: High levels of red carotenoids (i.e. canthaxanthin) in the diet paradoxically lead to paler red coloration, which raises questions about potential constraints in the evolution of red carotenoid-based sexual signals.
- The metabolic cost of carrying a sexually selected trait in the male fiddler crab Uca pugilator
Summary: The large sexually selected claw of male fiddler crabs has no effect on the metabolic cost of locomotion during sustainable activity but may increase cost during strenuous, non-sustainable activity.
- A disparity between locomotor economy and territory-holding ability in male house mice
Summary: Male house mice that control exclusive polygynous territories are less economical runners compared with non-territory-holding males.
- Ultraviolet and yellow reflectance but not fluorescence is important for visual discrimination of conspecifics by Heliconius erato
Highlighted Article: Heliconius butterflies use a co-opted yellow pigment for conspecific communication, which predators find similarly aposematic compared with the ancestral yellow pigments used by non-Heliconius mimics.
- Hidden female physiological resistance to male accessory gland substances in a simultaneous hermaphrodite
Summary: The effect of accessory gland proteins transferred on the love-dart of land snails can remain hidden within a species as a result of physiological female resistance to male manipulation.