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Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America logoLink to Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America
. 1987 May;84(10):3312–3315. doi: 10.1073/pnas.84.10.3312

Geographic dialects in blind mole rats: role of vocal communication in active speciation.

E Nevo, G Heth, A Beiles, E Frankenberg
PMCID: PMC304859  PMID: 3472211

Abstract

We compared and contrasted the physical structure of male "courtship" calls of 59 subterranean mole rats belonging to the Spalax ehrenbergi superspecies in Israel, comprising 11 populations of four chromosomal species (2N = 52, 54, 58, and 60). We also conducted behavioral auditory discrimination tests of 144 females of the four species in the laboratory. The results indicate that each chromosomal species has a vocal dialect significantly different from all others, although the call of 2N = 60, the last derivative of speciation, is not yet fully differentiated. Females of 2N = 52, 54, and 58 preferred their homospecific mates' calls, whereas females of 2N = 60 did not. We conclude that call differentiation builds up gradually and provides an efficient ethological reproductive premating isolation mechanism between the emerging species in the active speciation of mole rats in Israel.

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Selected References

These references are in PubMed. This may not be the complete list of references from this article.

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