Logo du site
  • English
  • Français
  • Se connecter
Logo du site
  • English
  • Français
  • Se connecter
  1. Accueil
  2. Université de Neuchâtel
  3. Publications
  4. The smell of hunger: Norway rats provision social partners based on odour cues of need
 
  • Details
Options
Vignette d'image

The smell of hunger: Norway rats provision social partners based on odour cues of need

Auteur(s)
Schneeberger, Karin
Röder, Gregory 
Cours de médecine 
Taborsky, Michael
Date de parution
2020-3-24
In
Plos Biology
Vol.
3
No
18
De la page
1
A la page
13
Mots-clés
  • Rats
  • Behavior
  • Cooperation
  • Food
  • Smell
  • Volatile organic compounds
  • Rats

  • Behavior

  • Cooperation

  • Food

  • Smell

  • Volatile organic comp...

Résumé
When individuals exchange helpful acts reciprocally, increasing the benefit of the receiver can enhance its propensity to return a favour, as pay-offs are typically correlated in iterated interactions. Therefore, reciprocally cooperating animals should consider the relative benefit for the receiver when deciding to help a conspecific. Norway rats (Rattus norvegicus) exchange food reciprocally and thereby take into account both the cost of helping and the potential benefit to the receiver. By using a variant of the sequential iterated prisoner’s dilemma paradigm, we show that rats may determine the need of another individual by olfactory cues alone. In an experimental food-exchange task, test subjects were provided with odour cues from hungry or satiated conspecifics located in a different room. Our results show that wild-type Norway rats provide help to a stooge quicker when they receive odour cues from a hungry rather than from a satiated conspecific. Using chemical analysis by gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS), we identify seven volatile organic compounds that differ in their abundance between hungry and satiated rats. Combined, this “smell of hunger” can apparently serve as a reliable cue of need in reciprocal cooperation, which supports the hypothesis of honest signalling.
Identifiants
https://libra.unine.ch/handle/123456789/28378
_
10.1371/journal.pbio.3000628
Type de publication
journal article
Dossier(s) à télécharger
 main article: 2020-06-19_1067_9073.pdf (1020.81 KB)
google-scholar
Présentation du portailGuide d'utilisationStratégie Open AccessDirective Open Access La recherche à l'UniNE Open Access ORCIDNouveautés

Service information scientifique & bibliothèques
Rue Emile-Argand 11
2000 Neuchâtel
contact.libra@unine.ch

Propulsé par DSpace, DSpace-CRIS & 4Science | v2022.02.00