Bats dynamically change echolocation parameters in response to acoustic playback
- Animals extract behaviorally relevant signals from “noisy” environments. To investigate signal extraction, echolocating provides a rich system testbed. For orientation, bats broadcast calls and assign each echo to the corresponding call. When orienting in acoustically enriched environments or when approaching targets, bats change their spectro-temporal call design. Thus, to assess call adjustments that are exclusively meant to facilitate signal extraction in “noisy” environments, it is necessary to control for distance-dependent call changes. By swinging bats in a pendulum, we tested the influence of acoustic playback on the echolocation behavior of Carollia perspicillata. This paradigm evokes reproducible orientation behavior and allows a precise definition of the influence of the acoustic context. Our results show that bats dynamically switch between different adaptations to cope with sound-based navigation in acoustically contaminated environments. These dynamics of echolocation behavior may explain the large variety of adaptations that have been reported in the bat literature.
Author: | Marcel Jerome BeetzORCiDGND, Manfred KösslORCiD, Julio C. Hechavarria-CueriaORCiDGND |
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URN: | urn:nbn:de:hebis:30:3-728051 |
DOI: | https://doi.org/10.1101/604603 |
Parent Title (English): | bioRxiv |
Document Type: | Preprint |
Language: | English |
Date of Publication (online): | 2020/07/30 |
Date of first Publication: | 2020/07/30 |
Publishing Institution: | Universitätsbibliothek Johann Christian Senckenberg |
Release Date: | 2023/06/13 |
Issue: | 604603 |
Page Number: | 32 |
HeBIS-PPN: | 50939597X |
Institutes: | Biowissenschaften |
Dewey Decimal Classification: | 5 Naturwissenschaften und Mathematik / 59 Tiere (Zoologie) / 590 Tiere (Zoologie) |
Sammlungen: | Universitätspublikationen |
Licence (German): | Creative Commons - CC BY-NC - Namensnennung - Nicht kommerziell 4.0 International |