Bellowing bats and chemical cussing
2023; American Chemical Society; Volume: 101; Issue: 2 Linguagem: Inglês
10.1021/cen-10102-newscripts
ISSN2474-7408
Autores Tópico(s)Yersinia bacterium, plague, ectoparasites research
ResumoHow bats hit high notes Bats, with their tiny creepy fingers and nightmare ratlike faces, are notorious for their use of echolocation, high-pitched clicking sounds, to find and catch prey. The flying mammals are also known to growl. But according to research by Coen Eleman and coworkers at the University of Southern Denmark, bats also emit specialized screams ( PLoS Biology 2022, DOI: 10.1371/journal.pbio.3001881 ). In a technique akin to death-metal growls and Tuvan throat singing, bats create these screams by vibrating their "false vocal folds," structures in the throat near the vocal cords. In humans, these mucus-covered folds of skin sit just below the epiglottis. The team also found that the sounds bats use to echolocate come from thin vocal membranes that sit at the ends of their vocal cords. Humans don't have these vocal membranes, says Jonas Håkansson, a postdoctoral researcher now at the University of Colorado, Colorado
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