Theory suggests that male fitness generally increases steadily with mating rate, while one or
a few matings are sufficient for females to maximize their reproductive success. Contrary to …

The consequences of polyandry for female fitness are controversial. Sexual conflict studies
and a meta‐analysis of mating rates in insects suggest that there is a longevity cost when …

The past decade has seen a profound change in the scientific understanding of
reproduction. The traditional view of reproduction as a joint venture undertaken by two …

Chemical signals are omnipresent in sexual communication in the vast majority of living
organisms. The traditional paradigm was that their main purpose in sexual behaviour was to …

Publisher Summary This chapter reviews the current knowledge of variation in sperm
morphology over several levels of biological organization: variation within males (both within …

One of the more debated issues in evolutionary biology is why in many species females
mate with multiple males. For females, the primary function of copulation is to fertilize their …

The relationship between mechanical power output and forward velocity in bird flight is
controversial, bearing on the comparative physiology and ecology of locomotion,. Applied to …

Postcopulatory sexual selection comprises both sperm competition, where the sperm from
different males compete for fertilization, and cryptic female choice, where females bias …

It is well known that sexual selection can target reproductive traits during successive pre‐
and post‐mating episodes of selection. A key focus of recent studies has been to understand …

We suggest that damaging mating tactics, such as physical aggression, the evolution of
genital barbs and spines, and the transfer of seminal toxins may serve as a general means …