Forum for Science, Industry and Business

More news in the battle between the sexes

By employing experimental evolution to study the effects of mating within and between different insect populations, researchers have gained insight into the ways in which sexual selection can affect fitness and influence various aspects of evolutionary change.

As a consequence of investigating the short-term fitness consequences of mate choice, researchers had largely come to believe that sexual selection is beneficial. However, conflicts between the sexes are ubiquitous and could erode fitness. Although sexual conflict is widespread, its evolutionary consequences remain largely unknown.

In the new study, which broadens our understanding of sexual selection and sexual conflict, Oliver Martin and David Hosken from the University of Zürich subjected flies to experimental evolution for 44 generations and looked at the fitness consequences of evolving under high, low, or relaxed sexual conflict. Their results indicate that foreign males from the conflict populations are more costly to females than familiar males and that sexual selection can be costly to fitness. However, they also found that at intermediate levels of sexual conflict, benefits of sexual selection may outweigh these costs.

Heidi Hardman | EurekAlert!
Further information:
http://www.cell.com/

Im Focus: Spider silk key to new bone-fixing composite

University of Connecticut researchers have created a biodegradable composite made of silk fibers that can be used to repair broken load-bearing bones without the complications sometimes presented by other materials.

Repairing major load-bearing bones such as those in the leg can be a long and uncomfortable process.

Im Focus: Writing and deleting magnets with lasers

Study published in the journal ACS Applied Materials & Interfaces is the outcome of an international effort that included teams from Dresden and Berlin in Germany, and the US.

Scientists at the Helmholtz-Zentrum Dresden-Rossendorf (HZDR) together with colleagues from the Helmholtz-Zentrum Berlin (HZB) and the University of Virginia...

Im Focus: Gamma-ray flashes from plasma filaments

Novel highly efficient and brilliant gamma-ray source: Based on model calculations, physicists of the Max PIanck Institute for Nuclear Physics in Heidelberg propose a novel method for an efficient high-brilliance gamma-ray source. A giant collimated gamma-ray pulse is generated from the interaction of a dense ultra-relativistic electron beam with a thin solid conductor. Energetic gamma-rays are copiously produced as the electron beam splits into filaments while propagating across the conductor. The resulting gamma-ray energy and flux enable novel experiments in nuclear and fundamental physics.

The typical wavelength of light interacting with an object of the microcosm scales with the size of this object. For atoms, this ranges from visible light to...

Im Focus: Basel researchers succeed in cultivating cartilage from stem cells

Stable joint cartilage can be produced from adult stem cells originating from bone marrow. This is made possible by inducing specific molecular processes occurring during embryonic cartilage formation, as researchers from the University and University Hospital of Basel report in the scientific journal PNAS.

Certain mesenchymal stem/stromal cells from the bone marrow of adults are considered extremely promising for skeletal tissue regeneration. These adult stem...

Im Focus: Like a wedge in a hinge

Researchers lay groundwork to tailor drugs for new targets in cancer therapy

In the fight against cancer, scientists are developing new drugs to hit tumor cells at so far unused weak points. Such a “sore spot” is the protein complex...