Scratching Beneath the Surface : Intentionality in Great Ape Signal production

Despite important similarities having been found between human and animal communication systems, surprisingly little research effort has focussed on whether the cognitive mechanisms underpinning these behaviours are also similar. In particular, it is highly debated whether signal production is the result of reflexive processes, or can be characterised as intentional. Here, we critically evaluate the criteria that are used to identify signals produced with different degrees of intentionality, and discuss recent attempts to apply these criteria to the vocal, gestural, and multimodal communicative signals of great apes and more distantly related species. Finally, we outline the necessary research tools, such as physiologically validated measures of arousal, and empirical evidence that we believe would propel this debate forward and help unravel the evolutionary origins of human intentional communication

Chimpanzees Share Forbidden Fruit

The sharing of wild plant foods is infrequent in chimpanzees, but in chimpanzee communities that engage in hunting, meat is frequently used as a ‘social tool’ for nurturing alliances and social bonds. Here we report the only recorded example of regular sharing of plant foods by unrelated, non-provisioned wild chimpanzees, and the contexts in which these sharing behaviours occur. From direct observations, adult chimpanzees at Bossou (Republic of Guinea, West Africa) very rarely transferred wild plant foods. In contrast, they shared cultivated plant foods much more frequently (58 out of 59 food sharing events). Sharing primarily consists of adult males allowing reproductively cycling females to take food that they possess. We propose that hypotheses focussing on ‘food-for-sex and -grooming’ and ‘showing-off’ strategies plausibly account for observed sharing behaviours. A changing human-dominated landscape presents chimpanzees with fresh challenges, and our observations suggest that crop-raiding provides adult male chimpanzees at Bossou with highly desirable food commodities that may be traded for other currencies

Speaker- versus listener-oriented disfluency: A re-examination of arguments and assumptions from autism spectrum disorder

We re-evaluate conclusions about disfluency production in high-functioning forms of autism spectrum disorder (HFA). Previous studies examined individuals with HFA to address a theoretical question regarding speaker- and listener-oriented disfluencies. Individuals with HFA tend to be self-centric and have poor pragmatic language skills, and should be less likely to produce listener-oriented disfluency. However, previous studies did not account for individual differences variables that affect disfluency. We show that both matched and unmatched controls produce fewer repairs than individuals with HFA. For silent pauses, there was no difference between matched controls and HFA, but both groups produced more than unmatched controls. These results identify limitations in prior research and shed light on the relationship between autism spectrum disorders and disfluent speech

Sheep Updates 2008 - part 3

This session covers fiveteen papers from different authors: CONTROLLING FLY STRIKE 1. Breeding for Blowfly Resistance - Indicatoe Traits, LJE Karlsson, JC Greeff, L Slocombe, Department of Agriculture & Food, Western Australia 2.A practical method to select for breech strike resistance in non-pedigreed Merino flocks, LJE Karlsson, JC Greeff, L Slocombe, K. Jones, N. Underwood, Department of Agriculture & Food, Western Australia 3. Twice a year shearing - no mulesing, Fred Wilkinson, Producer, Brookton WA BEEF 4. Commercial testing of a new tool for prediction of fatness in beef cattle, WD HoffmanA, WA McKiernanA, VH OddyB, MJ McPheeA, Cooperative Research Centre for Beef Genetic Technologies, A N.S.W. Deptartment of Primary Industries, B University of New England 5. A new tool for the prediction of fatness in beef cattle, W.A. McKiernanA, V.H. OddyB and M.J. McPheeC; Cooperative Research Centre for Beef Genetic Technologies, A N.S.W. Dept of Primary Industries, B University of New England, C N.S.W. Dept of Primary Industries Beef Industry Centre of Excellence. 6. Effect of gene markers for tenderness on eating quality of beef, B.L. McIntyre, CRC for Beef Genetic Technologies, Department of Agriculture and Food WA 7. Accelerating beef industry innovation through Beef Profit Partnerships, Parnell PF1,2, Clark RA1,3, Timms J1,3, Griffith G1,2, Alford A1,2, Mulholland C1 and Hyland P1,4,1Co-operative Research Centre for Beef Genetic Technologies; 2NSW Department of Primary Industries; 3 Qld Department of Primary Industries and Fisheries; 4The University of Queensland. SUSTAINABILITY 8. The WA Sheep Industry - is it ethically and environmentally sustainable? Danielle England, Department of Agriculture and Food Western Australia 9. Overview of ruminant agriculture and greenhouse emissions, Fiona Jones, Department of Agriculture and Food Western Australia 10. Grazing for Nitrogen Efficiency, John Lucey, Martin Staines and Richard Morris, Department of Agriculture and Food Western Australia 11. Investigating potential adaptations to climate change for low rainfall farming system, Megan Abrahams, Caroline Peek, Dennis Van Gool, Daniel Gardiner, Kari-Lee Falconer, Department of Agriculture and Food Western Australia SHEEP 12. Benchmarking ewe productivity through on-farm genetic comparisons, Sandra Prosser, Mario D’Antuono and Johan Greeff; Department of Agriculture and Food Western Australia 13. Increasing profitability by pregnancy scanning ewes, John Young1, Andrew Thompson2 and Chris Oldham2; 1Farming Systems Analysis Service, Kojonup, WA, 2Department of Agriculture and Food Western Australia 14. Targeted treatment of worm-affected sheep - more efficient, more sustainable, Brown Besier, Department of Agriculture and Food Western Australia 15. Improving Weaner Sheep Survival, Angus Campbell and Ralph Behrendt, Cooperative Research Centre for Sheep Industry Innovatio

Female Chimpanzees Use Copulation Calls Flexibly to Prevent Social Competition

The adaptive function of copulation calls in female primates has been debated for years. One influential idea is that copulation calls are a sexually selected trait, which enables females to advertise their receptive state to males. Male-male competition ensues and females benefit by getting better mating partners and higher quality offspring. We analysed the copulation calling behaviour of wild female chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes schweinfurthii) at Budongo Forest, Uganda, but found no support for the male-male competition hypothesis. Hormone analysis showed that the calling behaviour of copulating females was unrelated to their fertile period and likelihood of conception. Instead, females called significantly more while with high-ranking males, but suppressed their calls if high-ranking females were nearby. Copulation calling may therefore be one potential strategy employed by female chimpanzees to advertise receptivity to high-ranked males, confuse paternity and secure future support from these socially important individuals. Competition between females can be dangerously high in wild chimpanzees, and our results indicate that females use their copulation calls strategically to minimise the risks associated with such competition

Utilising Drone Technology in Primatology for 3D Mapping

Emergent Unmanned Aerial System (or drone) technology allows the 3-dimensional mapping of forest landscapes, allowing a new perspective of arboreal primate habitat use. Utilising UASs in primatological studies enables the assessment of habitat quality for different arboreal primate species, the identification of discreet forms of anthropogenic disturbance (such as historical selective logging), and detailed investigation of canopy use by arboreal primate species. Combining 3D canopy structure with microclimate measurements, we can see how canopy structure buffers solar radiation and how arboreal species may be affected by future climate change. We present data on a study of the arboreal primate community in a lowland section of the Gunung Leuser Ecosystem in northern Sumatra, focusing on how 3D canopy structure effects ranging (siamang, Symphalangus syndactylus), different primate species’ population densities (lar gibbon, Hylobates lar, siamang and Thomas langur, Presbytis thomasi) and habitat selection (orang-utan, Pongo abelii and siamang) and how UAS technology can be utilised in other future studies; the potential opportunities, challenges and pitfalls

Quantum biology: an update and perspective

This is the final version. Available from MDPI via the DOI in this record. Data Availability Statement: Not applicable.Understanding the rules of life is one of the most important scientific endeavours and has revolutionised both biology and biotechnology. Remarkable advances in observation tech-niques allow us to investigate a broad range of complex and dynamic biological processes in which living systems could exploit quantum behaviour to enhance and regulate biological functions. Recent evidence suggests that these non-trivial quantum mechanical effects may play a crucial role in maintaining the non-equilibrium state of biomolecular systems. Quantum biology is the study of such quantum aspects of living systems. In this review, we summarise the latest progress in quantum biology, including the areas of enzyme-catalysed reactions, photosynthesis, spin-dependent reactions, DNA, fluorescent proteins, and ion channels. Many of these results are expected to be fundamental building blocks towards understanding the rules of life.Leverhulme Trus

Abilities to explicitly and implicitly infer intentions from actions in adults with autism spectrum disorder

Previous research suggests that Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) might be associated with impairments on implicit but not explicit mentalizing tasks. However, such comparisons are made difficult by the heterogeneity of stimuli and the techniques used to measure mentalizing capabilities. We tested the abilities of 34 individuals (17 with ASD) to derive intentions from others’ actions during both explicit and implicit tasks and tracked their eye-movements. Adults with ASD displayed explicit but not implicit mentalizing deficits. Adults with ASD displayed typical fixation patterns during both implicit and explicit tasks. These results illustrate an explicit mentalizing deficit in adults with ASD, which cannot be attributed to differences in fixation patterns

The evolution of self-control

This work was supported by the National Evolutionary Synthesis Center (NESCent) through support of a working group led by C.L.N. and B.H. NESCent is supported by the National Science Foundation (NSF) EF-0905606. For training in phylogenetic comparative methods, we thank the AnthroTree Workshop (supported by NSF BCS-0923791). Y.S. thanks the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Project 31170995) and National Basic Research Program (973 Program: 2010CB833904). E.E.B. thanks the Duke Vertical Integration Program and the Duke Undergraduate Research Support Office. J.M.P. was supported by a Newton International Fellowship from the Royal Society and the British Academy. L.R.S. thanks the James S. McDonnell Foundation for Award 220020242. L.J.N.B. and M.L.P. acknowledge the National Institutes of Mental Health (R01-MH096875 and R01-MH089484), a Duke Institute for Brain Sciences Incubator Award (to M.L.P.), and a Duke Center for Interdisciplinary Decision Sciences Fellowship (to L.J.N.B.). E.V. and E.A. thank the Programma Nazionale per la Ricerca–Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche (CNR) Aging Program 2012–2014 for financial support, Roma Capitale–Museo Civico di Zoologia and Fondazione Bioparco for hosting the Istituto di Scienze e Tecnologie della Cognizione–CNR Unit of Cognitive Primatology and Primate Centre, and Massimiliano Bianchi and Simone Catarinacci for assistance with capuchin monkeys. K.F. thanks the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science (JSPS) for Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research 20220004. F. Aureli thanks the Stages in the Evolution and Development of Sign Use project (Contract 012-984 NESTPathfinder) and the Integrating Cooperation Research Across Europe project (Contract 043318), both funded by the European Community’s Sixth Framework Programme (FP6/2002–2006). F. Amici was supported by Humboldt Research Fellowship for Postdoctoral Researchers (Humboldt ID 1138999). L.F.J. and M.M.D. acknowledge NSF Electrical, Communications, and Cyber Systems Grant 1028319 (to L.F.J.) and an NSF Graduate Fellowship (to M.M.D.). C.H. thanks Grant-in-Aid for JSPS Fellows (10J04395). A.T. thanks Research Fellowships of the JSPS for Young Scientists (21264). F.R. and Z.V. acknowledge Austrian Science Fund (FWF) Project P21244-B17, the European Research Council (ERC) under the European Union’s Seventh Framework Programme (FP/2007–2013)/ERC Grant Agreement 311870 (to F.R.), Vienna Science and Technology Fund Project CS11-026 (to Z.V.), and many private sponsors, including Royal Canin for financial support and the Game Park Ernstbrunn for hosting the Wolf Science Center. S.M.R. thanks the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council (Canada). J.K.Y. thanks the US Department of Agriculture–Wildlife Services–National Wildlife Research Center. J.F.C. thanks the James S. McDonnell Foundation and Alfred P. Sloan Foundation. E.L.M. and B.H. thank the Duke Lemur Center and acknowledge National Institutes of Health Grant 5 R03 HD070649-02 and NSF Grants DGE-1106401, NSF-BCS-27552, and NSF-BCS-25172. This is Publication 1265 of the Duke Lemur Center.Cognition presents evolutionary research with one of its greatest challenges. Cognitive evolution has been explained at the proximate level by shifts in absolute and relative brain volume and at the ultimate level by differences in social and dietary complexity. However, no study has integrated the experimental and phylogenetic approach at the scale required to rigorously test these explanations. Instead, previous research has largely relied on various measures of brain size as proxies for cognitive abilities. We experimentally evaluated these major evolutionary explanations by quantitatively comparing the cognitive performance of 567 individuals representing 36 species on two problem-solving tasks measuring self-control. Phylogenetic analysis revealed that absolute brain volume best predicted performance across species and accounted for considerably more variance than brain volume controlling for body mass. This result corroborates recent advances in evolutionary neurobiology and illustrates the cognitive consequences of cortical reorganization through increases in brain volume. Within primates, dietary breadth but not social group size was a strong predictor of species differences in self-control. Our results implicate robust evolutionary relationships between dietary breadth, absolute brain volume, and self-control. These findings provide a significant first step toward quantifying the primate cognitive phenome and explaining the process of cognitive evolution.PostprintPeer reviewe