Animal signals may result from construction behaviour and can provide receivers with
essential information in various contexts. Here we explore the potential benefits of extended …

Phenotypic characters with a complex physical basis may have a correspondingly complex
evolutionary history. Males in the “bee” hummingbird clade court females with sound from …

Abstract The bowerbirds in New Guinea and Australia include species that build the largest
and perhaps most elaborately decorated constructions outside of humans. The males use …

Variation in visual spectral tuning has evolved in concert with signal colour in some taxa, but
there is limited evidence of this pattern in birds. To further investigate this possibility, we …

The bowerbirds (family Ptilonorhynchidae) are famed for their unique bower-building
behaviour. In some species, the bower can be a complex construction of sticks and other …

Several studies have suggested that peak plumage reflectance in birds matches color
preferences used in mate choice. We tested this hypothesis in adult satin bowerbird males …

Chagas disease (CD) is a tropical disease caused by the parasite Trypanosoma cruzi,
transmitted by the barber insect. Currently, there are approximately 7 million infected people …

Tests of hypotheses addressing the evolution of complex traits have greatly benefited from
advances in the field of molecular genetics. Current molecular techniques allow for the …

One of the greatest conundrums facing evolutionary biologists is how variation between
individuals is maintained in situations where there is expected to be strong directional …

Borgia et al.(2007) critique several points of our recent paper on bowerbird color pattern
evolution (Endler et al. 2005). I agree with some of their specific points, but the issues they …