Title |
Mating Plugs in Polyandrous Giants: Which Sex Produces Them, When, How and Why?
|
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Published in |
PLOS ONE, July 2012
|
DOI | 10.1371/journal.pone.0040939 |
Pubmed ID | |
Authors |
Matjaž Kuntner, Matjaž Gregorič, Shichang Zhang, Simona Kralj-Fišer, Daiqin Li |
Abstract |
Males usually produce mating plugs to reduce sperm competition. However, females can conceivably also produce mating plugs in order to prevent unwanted, superfluous and energetically costly matings. In spiders-appropriate models for testing plugging biology hypotheses-mating plugs may consist of male genital parts and/or of amorphous covers consisting of glandular or sperm secretions. In the giant wood spider Nephila pilipes, a highly sexually dimorphic and polygamous species, males are known to produce ineffective embolic plugs through genital damage, but nothing is known about the origin and function of additional conspicuous amorphous plugs (AP) covering female genitals. |
X Demographics
Geographical breakdown
Country | Count | As % |
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Hungary | 1 | 50% |
Unknown | 1 | 50% |
Demographic breakdown
Type | Count | As % |
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Members of the public | 2 | 100% |
Mendeley readers
Geographical breakdown
Country | Count | As % |
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United States | 5 | 7% |
Hungary | 2 | 3% |
Brazil | 2 | 3% |
Réunion | 1 | 1% |
Canada | 1 | 1% |
Switzerland | 1 | 1% |
Unknown | 56 | 82% |
Demographic breakdown
Readers by professional status | Count | As % |
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Researcher | 17 | 25% |
Student > Ph. D. Student | 10 | 15% |
Student > Master | 8 | 12% |
Student > Bachelor | 8 | 12% |
Professor > Associate Professor | 6 | 9% |
Other | 13 | 19% |
Unknown | 6 | 9% |
Readers by discipline | Count | As % |
---|---|---|
Agricultural and Biological Sciences | 40 | 59% |
Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology | 4 | 6% |
Environmental Science | 3 | 4% |
Earth and Planetary Sciences | 2 | 3% |
Unspecified | 1 | 1% |
Other | 4 | 6% |
Unknown | 14 | 21% |