The Friends Society of the University of Veterinary Medicine, Vienna, has awarded prizes to three young researchers.  Denise Aydinonat received the prize for companion animals 2014.  In her PhD dissertation at the Institute for Medical Biochemistry and the Konrad Lorenz Institute of Ethology she was able to show that socially deprived African grey parrots in solitary confinement have shorter telomeres than parrots that are kept in pairs. This research is of great importance for companion animal keeping.  The title of her disseration is "Impact of Social Deprivation on Telomere Length in African Grey Parrots".  Congratulations!

More info (in German only)

(Web editor, 12 December 2014)

Mate choice is often the most important decision in the lives of humans and animals. Scientists at the Konrad Lorenz Institute of Ethology at the Vetmeduni Vienna have found the first evidence that birds may choose their mate through odor. The researchers compared the preen gland chemicals of black-legged kittiwakes with genes that play a role in immunity. Kittiwakes that smell similarly to each other also have similar genes for immunity. Since the birds prefer to mate with unrelated mates, the scientists have now found the likely mechanism by which they recognize relatedness. The article “Preen secretions encode information on MHC similarity in certain sex-dyads in a monogamous seabird” was published in the  online Journal Scientific Reports.

More info

(Web editor,  28 November 2014)

Parents usually want what´s best for their offspring.  Researchers at the Vetmeduni Vienna wanted to check if this is always true for blue tits.  Katharina Mahr and colleagues from KLIVV tested whether these birds really risk it all to protect their young from predators.  They found that parents weigh up the risks, both to their young and to themselves, before deciding on a nest defense strategy.  The results are published in the journal Proceedings of the Royal Society B.

(Web editor, 12 December 2014)

The 100th birthday of Otto Koenig was celebrated on Vienna´s Wilhelminenberg on 23 October 2014.  Together with his wife Lilli, the naturalist and conservationist founded the "Biological Station WIlheminenberg" after World War II ended, using abandoned military barracks.  Today it is home to the Konrad Lorenz Institute of Ethology of the Vetmeduni Vienna.  Otto and Lilli Koenig kept many animal species in aviaries, fish tanks, and enclosures on the premises.  The approach of studying wild animals both in captivity and in their natural habitats continues to this day.  The University recognized Otto and Lilli Koenig´s contributions to wildlife biology with a ceremony and a plaque.

More info (in German)

 (Web editor 23 October 2014)

Prof. Leonida Fusani joined the Konrad Lorenz Institute of Ethology on 1 September 2014.  In a joint professorship of the University of Veterinary Medicine and the University of Vienna, he leads the ornithology working group and the Austrian ornithological station.  His research interests focus on the physiology and behaviour of birds.   The biologist is investigating the evolutionary origins of behaviour, combining findings from classic ethology with insights from research on hormones and neuroscience. 

More info (in German)

(Web editor, 15 October 2014)

Artificial light in cities exerts negative effects on humans, animals, and their environment. In an ongoing research project, behavioral biologists at Vetmeduni Vienna are investigating how blue tits in the Viennese Forests react to "light pollution". The study might help to understand effects of “light-at-night” on reproductive behavior of birds. In consequence, it could help developing concepts, minimizing negative effects on the lives of animals and the ecological system, by reducing light sources in specific regions. The research project started this year and is supported by the city of Vienna.

(Web editor, 6 August 2014)

It is often suggested that multiple male mating (polyandry) functions to increase the genetic diversity of a female’s offspring, and recently we conducted the first study to experimentally test whether females actively engage in multiple mating when they have the opportunity to enhance the genetic diversity of their offspring. An experimental study at the Konrad Lorenz Institute of Ethology has shown that the genetic similarity of potential partners has no influence on the probability of multiple mating when female house mice can freely choose between males.  The researchers also found no evidence that the rate of multiple sired litters was higher when females were inbred versus outbred.  On average 29% of the litters were multiple sired, the same level that had previously been found in populations of wild house mice.  Thus, the findings do not support the hypothesis that females actively engage in multiple mating to enhance the genetic diversity of offspring, contrary to the genetic diversity hypothesis.

The article  "Multiple paternity does not depend on male genetic diversity" by K.E. Thonhauser, S. Raveh, and D.J. Penn is published in the July 2014 edition of the journal Animal Behaviour. 

(Web editor, 6 June2014)

Grouping behaviour is widespread in animals. One important reason for grouping is the reduction of individual predation risk; the larger a group, the greater the protection for the individual. Fishes are often used in experimental research to study the causes of grouping.  Numerous studies have so far demonstrated that fishes prefer to shoal with larger groups.  Most studies have examined small groups, but in nature group sizes can be up to several hundreds of individuals.  Now KLIVV researchers and colleagues have examined group size preferences in three-spined sticklebacks and found that in general test fish preferred the larger group.  However, this was the case only up to a point: preference for the large group decreased with decreasing group size differences. 

The article “Context-dependent group size preferences in large shoals of three-spined sticklebacks” by T. Thünkena, M. Eigsterb, and J. Frommen was published in the journal  Animal Behaviour in March 2014.

(Web editor, 25 April 2014)

The genes of the major histocompatibility complex (MHC), which control immune recognition of parasites, are highly diverse, but it is difficult to explain how natural selection maintains such genetic diversity. An interdisciplinary team of scientists from the Konrad Lorenz Institute of Ethology of the Vetmeduni Vienna and four other universities, wanted to find out whether parasites drive MHC diversity, and whether adaptation to local parasites promotes genetic divergence among different host populations.  The article “Selection from parasites favours immunogenetic diversity but not divergence among locally adapted host populations” by M. Tobler, M. Plath, R. Riesch, I. Schlupp, A. Grasse, G. K. Munimanda, C. Setzer, D. Penn und Y. Moodley appeared on 12.4.2014 online in the journal Journal of Evolutionary Biology.

More info

(Web editor 15 April 2014)

Telomeres are DNA-protein complexes that function as protective caps at the ends of chromosomes.  Biologists and veterinarians at the Vetmeduni Vienna recently examined the telomere length of captive African grey parrots.  They found that the telomere lengths of single parrots were shorter than those housed with a companion parrot, which supports the hypothesis that social stress can interfere with cellular aging and a particular type of DNA repair. It suggests that telomeres may provide a biomarker for assessing exposure to social stress.  The article "Social Isolation Shortens Telomeres in African Grey Parrots (Psittacus erithacus erithacus)" by D. Aydinonat, D. Penn, S. Smith, Y. Moodley, F. Hoelzl, F. Knauer and F. Schwarzenberger was published in the journal PLOS ONE.

More info

(Web editor 5 April 2014)

The adaptive functions of mate choice remain unclear and one of the most challenging problems in behavioural ecology. It is often proposed that females should select genetically dissimilar mates to maximize offspring genetic diversity and avoid inbreeding.  However, in some instances females seem to prefer genetically similar males. This could be beneficial for their offspring if a population is genetically well adapted to local environmental conditions.  A collaborative study between the Konrad Lorenz Institute of Ethology and the University of Burgundy investigated whether mating patterns of house sparrows are influenced by genetic factors. more...

The paper “Females tend to prefer genetically similar mates in an island population of house sparrows” by Coraline Bichet, Dustin J Penn, Yoshan Moodley, Luc Dunoyer, Elise Cellier-Holzem, Marie Belvalette, Arnaud Grégoire, Stéphane Garnier and Gabriele Sorci was published in March 2014 in the journal BMC Evolutionary Biology.  It was highlighted as an "editor´s choice" article.

(Web editor 4 April 2014)

One of the hottest debates in evolutionary biology concerns the origin of behaviour: is it genetically encoded or do animals and birds copy their parents or other individuals? A classic experiment published in 2000 seemed to provide overwhelming evidence that a particular behavioural choice (whether individuals of a species of swallow breed in a small colony or a large one) is largely genetically determined. Together with colleagues in France, Richard Wagner of the University of Veterinary Medicine, Vienna has re-examined the data and shown that the findings could be explained by random choice. The design of the original experiment – which represents a blueprint for a vast range of studies of heritability of behaviour – contains two pitfalls that combine to undermine the conclusions. The results are published in the journal Scientific Reports.

More info

(Web editor 25 February 2014)

Offspring from female mice who mate with their preferred male are better able to cope with an experimental infection compared to those of females mated with non-preferred males, according to new results published today. The findings by scientists at KLIVV have been published in the open access journal BMC Evolutionary Biology.  The article was even selected as "editor´s choice" piece.

More info

(Web editor 23 January 2014)