Structural adaptations to diverse fighting styles in sexually selected weapons.

ABSTRACT: The shapes of sexually selected weapons differ widely among species, but the drivers of this diversity remain poorly understood. Existing explanations suggest weapon shapes reflect structural adaptations to different fighting styles, yet explicit tests of this hypothesis are lacking. We constructed finite element models of the horns of different rhinoceros beetle species to test whether functional specializations for increased performance under species-specific fighting styles could have contributed to the diversification of weapon form. We find that horns are both stronger and stiffer in response to species-typical fighting loads and that they perform more poorly under atypical fighting loads, which suggests weapons are structurally adapted to meet the functional demands of fighting. Our

SUBMITTER: McCullough EL 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4209975 | biostudies-literature | 2014 Oct

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature