A framework for studying behavioral evolution by reconstructing ancestral repertoires.

ABSTRACT: Although different animal species often exhibit extensive variation in many behaviors, typically scientists examine one or a small number of behaviors in any single study. Here, we propose a new framework to simultaneously study the evolution of many behaviors. We measured the behavioral repertoire of individuals from six species of fruit flies using unsupervised techniques and identified all stereotyped movements exhibited by each species. We then fit a Generalized Linear Mixed Model to estimate the intra- and inter-species behavioral covariances, and, by using the known phylogenetic relationships among species, we estimated the (unobserved) behaviors exhibited by ancestral species. We found that much of intra-specific behavioral variation has a similar covariance structure to previously

SUBMITTER: Hernandez DG 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC8445618 | biostudies-literature | 2021 Sep

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature