Female Drosophila melanogaster respond to song-amplitude modulations

Biology Open

Birgit Brüggemeier¹  Stephen F. Goodwin¹  Jim O. Vigoreaux²  Mason A. Porter³ 

[1] Centre for Neural Circuits and Behaviour, University of Oxford, Oxford OX1 3SR, UK;Department of Biology, University of Vermont, Burlington, VT 05405, USA;Department of Mathematics, University of California, Los Angeles, Los Angeles, CA 90095, USA;

关键词: Drosophila;    Fruit flies;    Courtship;    Song amplitude structure;    Communication signals;   

DOI  :  10.1242/bio.032003

来源: DOAJ

【 摘 要 】

Males in numerous animal species use mating songs to attract females and intimidate competitors. We demonstrate that modulations in song amplitude are behaviourally relevant in the fruit fly Drosophila. We show that Drosophila melanogaster females prefer amplitude modulations that are typical of melanogaster song over other modulations, which suggests that amplitude modulations are processed auditorily by D. melanogaster. Our work demonstrates that receivers can decode messages in amplitude modulations, complementing the recent finding that male flies actively control song amplitude. To describe amplitude modulations, we propose the concept of song amplitude structure (SAS) and discuss similarities and differences to amplitude modulation with distance (AMD). This article has an associated First Person interview with the first author of the paper.

【 授权许可】

Unknown