[MARMAM] New Publication: Geographic variation of short-beaked common dolphin’s whistles

[Elena Papale]

Dear Colleagues,
My co-authors and I are pleased to announce the publication of the 
following paper:

E. Papale, M. Azzolin, I. Cascão, A. Gannier, M.O. Lammers, V.M. 
Martin, J. Oswald, M. Perez-Gil, R. Prieto, M.A. Silva & C. Giacoma.
Macro- and micro-geographic variation of short-beaked common dolphin’s 
whistles in the Mediterranean Sea and Atlantic Ocean.
Ethology Ecology & Evolution (2013)
DOI: 10.1080/03949370.2013.851122

Genetic studies have shown that there are small but significant 
differences between the short-beaked common dolphin populations in the 
Atlantic Ocean and those in the Mediterranean Sea. The short-beaked 
common dolphin is a highly vocal species with a wide sound production 
repertoire including whistles. Whistles are continuous, narrowband, 
frequency-modulated signals that can show geographic variation in 
dolphin species. This study tests whether the differences, highlighted 
by genetic studies, are recognisable in the acoustic features of 
short-beaked common dolphin’s whistles in the two adjacent areas of the 
Atlantic Ocean and the Mediterranean Sea. From a selected sample of good 
quality whistles (514 recorded in the Atlantic and 193 in the 
Mediterranean) 10 parameters of duration, frequency and frequency 
modulation were measured. Comparing data among basins, differences were 
found for duration and all frequency parameters except for minimum 
frequency. Modulation parameters showed the highest coefficient of 
variation. Through discriminant analysis we correctly assigned 75.7% of 
sounds to their basins. Furthermore, micro-geographic analysis revealed 
similarity between the sounds recorded around the Azores and the Canary 
archipelagos and between the Bay of Biscay and the Mediterranean Sea. 
Results are in agreement with the hypothesis proposed by previous 
genetic studies that two distinct populations are present, still 
supposing a gene flow between the basins. This study is the first to 
compare short beaked common dolphin’s whistles of the Atlantic Ocean and 
the Mediterranean areas.


The full article can be found online at:
http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/03949370.2013.851122
Or http://www.tandfonline.com/eprint/Jgg75I6ZkbZN3X397i2M/full

Please contact me if you do not have access to the article
(elena.papale at unito.it)


-- 
Elena Papale, PhD
Department of Life Science and Systems Biology
Univesity of Torino,
Via Accademia Albertina 13,
10123 Torino
Italy