The American scientists Susan Alberts, Jeanne Altmann and Marlene Zuk received the Frontiers of Knowledge Award this Thursday because they demonstrated the key role of social behavior in the evolution of animals and the importance for species protection. This is the fifteenth edition that the BBVA Foundation celebrates, recognizing the contributions of diverse academics in the fields of science, technology, humanities and artistic creation each year.
The three distinguished scientists receive the award in the category Ecology and Conservation Biology. The award jury highlighted that these scientists have “an enhanced understanding of the evolutionary importance of behavior as a driver of animal survival, reproduction and adaptation,” demonstrating “the need to incorporate social interactions into conservation plans.”
Altmann, Professor Emeritus of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at Princeton University, founded an innovative research project in Kenya’s Amboseli National Park in 1971 that has been studying the behavior of baboons for more than five decades. And joined in 1983 by Susan Alberts, professor of evolutionary biology and anthropology at Duke University.
Currently, the two scientists are leading this research together, which has followed 2,000 primates and shows how interactions between males, females and offspring over several generations determine the social structure of these animals.
The specialists discovered “true paternal care,” pointing to the important role males play in caring for their young. Both males and females mate with multiple partners, but males are able to identify and care for their own young. Another finding of the research was the important role that women, just like men, play in social interactions. Going from allies to competitors and vice versa in a very short time, a crucial fact in any complex society. The award has prompted Amboseli prizewinners to claim that baboons can serve as models for studying the adaptability of many other animals to environmental degradation.
Silent crickets trying to survive
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The third of the award winners, Marlene Zuk, Professor of Ecology, Evolution and Behavior at the University of Minnesota, has studied the importance of parasites for the social behavior of animals. “We used to think that all of these organisms carried diseases. But in reality, they play a role in how animals choose their mates or how they interact with each other.”
Male crickets, for example, sing to attract females, so natural selection tends to favor the males that sing the most and best. But this seduction song not only attracts females, it also attracts the attention of a parasitic fly, Zuk explained. These flies deposit their larvae in the crickets, and the larvae feed on the insects from the inside and eat them alive. The ecologist observed how cricket populations mutated and fell silent over several generations to avoid being eaten by fly larvae. The cricket had to choose between passing on its genes or surviving. “This conflict of selection pressures, working in completely opposite directions, has caught the attention of scientists since Darwin,” Zuk pointed out.
The ecologist insists on the importance of studying these tiny animals. “We can’t keep something if we don’t know it’s there. A lot of people think we want to preserve the so-called charismatic megafauna, elephants and pandas, but I’m just as concerned about preserving the little things,” the ecologist explained.
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