Sexual and individual signatures are encoded in the temporal rate of Cape gannet display calls

Vocalisations play a vital role in animal communication, as they are involved in many biological functions. Seabirds often breed in large and dense colonies, making successful recognition between mates or between parents-and offspring crucial for reproductive success. Most seabird species, including Cape gannets (Morus capensis), are monomorphic and likely rely on acoustic signals for mate selection and mate recognition. This study aimed to better understand the use of vocalisations for sex and individual recognition in Cape gannets by describing the acoustic structure of their display calls at the nest. Vocalisations of nesting Cape gannets were recorded and acoustic measurements were extracted in both temporal and frequency domains. Values of the fundamental frequency and the average of Inter-Onset-Interval appeared to be the most important acoustic variables for sex determination. Both temporal and frequency parameters showed a potential for individual identity coding, with the average units Inter-Onset-Interval being the most important variable for individual identification for both sexes. This study provides the first evidence of sex-specific and individual vocal signatures in adult breeding Cape gannets. From an applied perspective, identified sex specific differences could potentially be used as a non-invasive method for field-based sex-determination in research and monitoring projects on Cape gannets.

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Acoustic cues to individuality in wild male adult African savannah elephants (Loxodonta africana)

PeerJ ◽

10.7717/peerj.10736 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 9 ◽

pp. e10736

Author(s):

Kaja Wierucka ◽

Michelle D. Henley ◽

Hannah S. Mumby

Keyword(s):

Communication Systems ◽

Animal Communication ◽

Current Knowledge ◽

Individual Recognition ◽

Social Bonds ◽

Loxodonta Africana ◽

Mature Male ◽

Acoustic Cues ◽

Acoustic Parameters ◽

Male Adult

The ability to recognize conspecifics plays a pivotal role in animal communication systems. It is especially important for establishing and maintaining associations among individuals of social, long-lived species, such as elephants. While research on female elephant sociality and communication is prevalent, until recently male elephants have been considered far less social than females. This resulted in a dearth of information about their communication and recognition abilities. With new knowledge about the intricacies of the male elephant social structure come questions regarding the communication basis that allows for social bonds to be established and maintained. By analyzing the acoustic parameters of social rumbles recorded over 1.5 years from wild, mature, male African savanna elephants (Loxodonta africana) we expand current knowledge about the information encoded within these vocalizations and their potential to facilitate individual recognition. We showed that social rumbles are individually distinct and stable over time and therefore provide an acoustic basis for individual recognition. Furthermore, our results revealed that different frequency parameters contribute to individual differences of these vocalizations.

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Maternally inherited peptides as strain-specific chemosignals

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences ◽

10.1073/pnas.2014712117 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 117 (48) ◽

pp. 30738-30743

Author(s):

Hideto Kaba ◽

Hiroko Fujita ◽

Takeshi Agatsuma ◽

Hiroaki Matsunami

Keyword(s):

Sensory Neurons ◽

Individual Recognition ◽

Vomeronasal Organ ◽

Mate Recognition ◽

Inbred Strains ◽

Specific Information ◽

Maternal Lineage ◽

Maternal Bonding ◽

Terminal Amino ◽

Nadh Dehydrogenases

Most mammals rely on chemosensory cues for individual recognition, which is essential to many aspects of social behavior, such as maternal bonding, mate recognition, and inbreeding avoidance. Both volatile molecules and nonvolatile peptides secreted by individual conspecifics are detected by olfactory sensory neurons in the olfactory epithelium and the vomeronasal organ. The pertinent cues used for individual recognition remain largely unidentified. Here we show that nonformylated, but notN-formylated, mitochondrially encoded peptides—that is, the nine N-terminal amino acids of NADH dehydrogenases 1 and 2—can be used to convey strain-specific information among individual mice. We demonstrate that these nonformylated peptides are sufficient to induce a strain-selective pregnancy block. We also observed that the pregnancy block by an unfamiliar peptide derived from a male of a different strain was prevented by a memory formed at the time of mating with that male. Our findings also demonstrate that pregnancy-blocking chemosignals in the urine are maternally inherited, as evidenced by the production of reciprocal sons from two inbred strains and our test of their urine’s ability to block pregnancy. We propose that this link between polymorphic mitochondrial peptides and individual recognition provides the molecular means to communicate an individual’s maternal lineage and strain.

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Cow Rump Identification Based on Lightweight Convolutional Neural Networks

Information ◽

10.3390/info12090361 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 12 (9) ◽

pp. 361

Author(s):

Handan Hou ◽

Wei Shi ◽

Jinyan Guo ◽

Zhe Zhang ◽

Weizheng Shen ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Neural Networks ◽

Convolutional Neural Networks ◽

Dairy Cow ◽

Individual Recognition ◽

Animal Husbandry ◽

Identification Accuracy ◽

Individual Identification ◽

Production Environment ◽

Accurate Identification ◽

Computing Device

Individual identification of dairy cows based on computer vision technology shows strong performance and practicality. Accurate identification of each dairy cow is the prerequisite of artificial intelligence technology applied in smart animal husbandry. While the rump of each dairy cow also has lots of important features, so do the back and head, which are also important for individual recognition. In this paper, we propose a non-contact cow rump identification method based on convolutional neural networks. First, the rump image sequences of the cows while feeding were collected. Then, an object detection model was applied to detect the cow rump object in each frame of image. Finally, a fine-tuned convolutional neural network model was trained to identify cow rumps. An image dataset containing 195 different cows was created to validate the proposed method. The method achieved an identification accuracy of 99.76%, which showed a better performance compared to other related methods and a good potential in the actual production environment of cow husbandry, and the model is light enough to be deployed in an edge-computing device.

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Mechanisms of recognition in birds and social Hymenoptera: from detection to information processing

Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B Biological Sciences ◽

10.1098/rstb.2019.0483 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 375 (1802) ◽

pp. 20190483 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Natacha Rossi ◽

Sébastien Derégnaucourt

Keyword(s):

Individual Recognition ◽

Experimental Tests ◽

Mate Recognition ◽

Social Hymenoptera ◽

Song Control System ◽

Recognition Systems ◽

Song Control ◽

Avian Song ◽

Evolving Models ◽

Nest Mate Recognition

In this opinion piece, we briefly review our knowledge of the mechanisms underlying auditory individual recognition in birds and chemical nest-mate recognition in social Hymenoptera. We argue that even though detection and perception of recognition cues are well studied in social Hymenoptera, the neural mechanisms remain a black box. We compare our knowledge of these insect systems with that of the well-studied avian ‘song control system’. We suggest that future studies on recognition should focus on the hypothesis of a distributed template instead of trying to locate the seat of the template as recent results do not seem to point in that direction. This article is part of the theme issue ‘Signal detection theory in recognition systems: from evolving models to experimental tests’.

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Familiarity and mating behavior in the subterranean rodent Ctenomys talarum (tuco-tuco)

Canadian Journal of Zoology ◽

10.1139/z07-078 ◽

2007 ◽

Vol 85 (9) ◽

pp. 944-955 ◽

Cited By ~ 11

Author(s):

Roxana R. Zenuto ◽

Candelaria Estavillo ◽

María Sol Fanjul

Keyword(s):

Mating Behavior ◽

Mate Selection ◽

Individual Recognition ◽

Scent Mark ◽

Subterranean Rodents ◽

Subterranean Rodent ◽

Odor Cues ◽

Mating Costs ◽

Neighbor Recognition ◽

Ctenomys Talarum

Biological odors that convey cues regarding individual identity are known to alter mating behavior in some rodents. Deposition of chemical signals by males on the substrate could give females information about their neighbors’ identity and allow familiarization with their odors. This study tested whether familiarization of females with conspecific male odors affects mating behavior in Ctenomys talarum Thomas, 1898, facilitating mating as a consequence of a decrease in aggressive behavior and an increase in sexual behavior. Tuco-tucos are solitary subterranean rodents that occupy and defend adjacent burrows. Both sexes usually scent-mark burrow openings, providing odor signals to neighbors during their aboveground patrolling and foraging activities. Hence, familiarity by odor cues may represent an important mechanism that mediates neighbor recognition and probably mate selection. In this study, familiarity was established by housing females with male odors for 8 days. In C. talarum, individual recognition by olfactory cues may reduce mating costs when pairing with neighbors, since females showed low aggression towards familiar males and copulations were not repeated in consecutive days. Females that were not exposed to male odors were more aggressive, but surprisingly these pairs copulated repeatedly.

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A highly informative microsatellite panel for individual identification and sex determination of jungle cats (Felis chaus)

Conservation Genetics Resources ◽

10.1007/s12686-013-9873-0 ◽

2013 ◽

Vol 5 (3) ◽

pp. 863-866 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Sandeep Sharma ◽

Trishna Dutta ◽

Jesús E. Maldonado ◽

Thomas C. Wood ◽

Hemendra Singh Panwar ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Sex Determination ◽

Individual Identification ◽

Felis Chaus

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The role of familiarity in signaller–receiver interactions

Journal of The Royal Society Interface ◽

10.1098/rsif.2018.0568 ◽

2018 ◽

Vol 15 (149) ◽

pp. 20180568

Author(s):

Wei Ji Ma ◽

James P. Higham

Keyword(s):

Animal Communication ◽

Individual Recognition ◽

Full Range ◽

Group Living ◽

Theoretical Work ◽

Bayesian Decision ◽

Theoretical Evidence ◽

Behavioural Biology ◽

Decision Making Model

In animal communication, individuals of species exhibiting individual recognition of conspecifics with whom they have repeated interactions, receive signals not only from unfamiliar conspecifics, but also from individuals with whom they have prior experience. Empirical evidence suggests that familiarity with a specific signaller aids receivers in interpreting that signaller's signals, but there has been little theoretical work on this effect. Here, we develop a Bayesian decision-making model and apply it to the well-studied systems of primate ovulation signals. We compare the siring probability of learner males versus non-learner males, based on variation in their assessment of the best time to mate and mate-guard females. We compare males of different dominance ranks, and vary the number of females, and their cycle synchrony. We find strong fitness advantages for learners, which manifest very quickly. Receivers do not have to see the full range of a signaller's signals in order to start gaining familiarity benefits. Reproductive asynchrony and increasing the number of females both enhance learning advantages. We provide theoretical evidence for a strong advantage to specific learning of a signaller's range of signals in signalling systems. Our results have broad implications, not only for understanding communication, but in elucidating additional fitness benefits to group-living, the evolution of individual recognition, and other characteristics of animal behavioural biology.

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Pig Face Recognition Model Based on a Cascaded Network

Applied Engineering in Agriculture ◽

10.13031/aea.14482 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 37 (5) ◽

pp. 879-890

Author(s):

Rong Wang ◽

ZaiFeng Shi ◽

Qifeng Li ◽

Ronghua Gao ◽

Chunjiang Zhao ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Face Recognition ◽

Face Detection ◽

Individual Recognition ◽

Recognition Performance ◽

Individual Identification ◽

List Type ◽

Recognition Model ◽

Model Based ◽

Face Images ◽

Cascaded Model

HighlightsA pig face recognition model that cascades the pig face detection network and pig face recognition network is proposed.The pig face detection network can automatically extract pig face images to reduce the influence of the background.The proposed cascaded model reaches accuracies of 99.38%, 98.96% and 97.66% on the three datasets.An application is developed to automatically recognize individual pigs.Abstract. The identification and tracking of livestock using artificial intelligence technology have been a research hotspot in recent years. Automatic individual recognition is the key to realizing intelligent feeding. Although RFID can achieve identification tasks, it is expensive and easily fails. In this article, a pig face recognition model that cascades a pig face detection network and a pig face recognition network is proposed. First, the pig face detection network is utilized to crop the pig face images from videos and eliminate the complex background of the pig shed. Second, batch normalization, dropout, skip connection, and residual modules are exploited to design a pig face recognition network for individual identification. Finally, the cascaded network model based on the pig face detection and recognition network is deployed on a GPU server, and an application is developed to automatically recognize individual pigs. Additionally, class activation maps generated by grad-CAM are used to analyze the performance of features of pig faces learned by the model. Under free and unconstrained conditions, 46 pigs are selected to make a positive pig face dataset, original multiangle pig face dataset and enhanced multiangle pig face dataset to verify the pig face recognition cascaded model. The proposed cascaded model reaches accuracies of 99.38%, 98.96%, and 97.66% on the three datasets, which are higher than those of other pig face recognition models. The results of this study improved the recognition performance of pig faces under multiangle and multi-environment conditions. Keywords: CNN, Deep learning, Pig face detection, Pig face recognition.

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Yolk lipid changes during embryonic development of the alligator and chicken : association with temperature dependent sex determination

Proceedings of the British Society of Animal Production (1972) ◽

10.1017/s0308229600019498 ◽

1990 ◽

Vol 1990 ◽

pp. 169-169

Author(s):

R.C. Noble ◽

M.W.J. Ferguson ◽

D.C. Deeming

Keyword(s):

Sex Determination ◽

Research Programme ◽

Vital Role ◽

Financial Loss ◽

Temperature Dependent ◽

Yolk Lipid ◽

Egg Incubation ◽

Close Phylogenetic Relationship ◽

Essential Nutrient ◽

Metabolic Data

The slaughter of male chickens at hatching in the egg industry constitutes a considerable financial loss. Although there is a close phylogenetic relationship with the chicken, the alligator displays the unique phenomena of temperature dependent sex determination i.e. the temperature of egg incubation determines the sex of the progeny (1). A comparison of chicken and alligator embryo metabolic data may thus suggest ways through which the sex determination operates and may be applied to the chicken. In the chicken and the alligator the lipids of the yolk perform a vital role as an essential nutrient and energy source to the developing embryo (2). As part of a wider research programme on temperature dependent sex determination, comparative data has been obtained on aspects of yolk lipid metabolism in the two species.

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Development of Communication Behaviour: Receiver Ontogeny in Túngara Frogs and a Prospectus for a Behavioural Evolutionary Development

The Scientific World JOURNAL ◽

10.1100/2012/680632 ◽

2012 ◽

Vol 2012 ◽

pp. 1-10 ◽

Cited By ~ 3

Author(s):

Alexander T. Baugh ◽

Kim L. Hoke ◽

Michael J. Ryan

Keyword(s):

Communication Systems ◽

Animal Communication ◽

Mate Recognition ◽

Evolutionary Development ◽

Communication Signals ◽

Tungara Frogs ◽

Signal Production ◽

Evolution Of Signals ◽

Evolution Of Communication ◽

Behaviour Recognition

Most studies addressing the development of animal communication have focused on signal production rather than receiver decoding, and similar emphasis has been given to learning over nonlearning. But receivers are an integral part of a communication network, and nonlearned mechanisms appear to be more ubiquitous than learned ones in the communication systems of most animals. Here we review the results of recent experiments and outline future directions for integrative studies on the development of a primarily nonlearned behaviour—recognition of communication signals during ontogeny in a tropical frog. The results suggest that antecedents to adult behaviours might be a common feature of developing organisms. Given the essential role that acoustic communication serves in reproduction for many organisms and that receivers can exert strong influence on the evolution of signals, understanding the evolutionary developmental basis of mate recognition will provide new insights into the evolution of communication systems.

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