In tethered flight, Parasphendale agrionina (Gerst.) males respond to ultrasonic stimuli with a unique suite of behaviors that includes full extension of the forelegs, strong dorsiflexion of the abdomen, a head roll, a 5% decrease in wingbeat frequency and a 33% increase in forewing excursion. Latency for the foreleg extension averages 66 ms while the latency to onset of yaw is 174 ms. The direction of the turn is unrelated to the location of the speaker. Yaw magnitude and latency are only weakly related to sound pressure level, and variability in these and other parameters is high. The behavior shows moderately sharp tuning to 40–60 kHz with a lowest mean threshold of 60 dB SPL. A male will not respond to ultrasound unless in flight, and the context-gating is independent of sensory input from the tarsi. Several components of the in-flight evasive behavior resemble defensive displays on the ground, and we suggest that this mantis has responded to predation pressure from bats with both flight-derived maneuvers and an aerial deimatic display.
In the field: an interview with Martha Muñoz
Martha Muñoz is an Assistant Professor at Yale University, investigating the evolutionary biology of anole lizards and lungless salamanders. In our new Conversation, she talks about her fieldwork in Indonesia, Costa Rica, the Dominican Republic and the Appalachian Mountains, including a death-defying dash to the top of a mountain through an approaching hurricane.
Call for new preLighters
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preLights is the preprint highlighting community supported by The Company of Biologists. At the heart of preLights are our preLighters: early-career researchers who select and write about interesting new preprints for the research community. We are currently looking for new preLighters to join our team. Find out more and apply here.
Graham Scott in conversation with Big Biology
Graham Scott talks to Big Biology about the oxygen cascade in mice living on mountaintops, extreme environments for such small organisms. In this JEB-sponsored episode, they discuss the concept of symmorphosis and the evolution of the oxygen cascade.
Trap-jaw ants coordinate tendon and exoskeleton for perfect mandible arc
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Trap-jaw ants run the risk of tearing themselves apart when they fire off their mandibles, but Greg Sutton & co have discovered that the ants simultaneously push and pull the mandibles using energy stored in a head tendon and their exoskeleton to drive the jaws in a perfect arc.
Hearing without a tympanic ear
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In their Review, Grace Capshaw, Jakob Christensen-Dalsgaard and Catherine Carr explore the mechanisms of hearing in extant atympanate vertebrates and the implications for the early evolution of tympanate hearing.
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