When?
Posted on 03/04/2019 12:29:00 AM PST by LibWhacker
Songs of musical rodents may offer insights into human conversation
In the understory of Central American cloud forests, musical mice trill songs to one another. Now a study of the charismatic creatures reveals how their brains orchestrate these rapid-fire duets.
The results, published in the March 1 Science, show that the brains of singing mice split up the musical work. One brain system directs the patterns of notes that make up songs, while another coordinates duets with another mouse, which are carried out with split-second precision.
The study suggests that “a quirky animal from the cloud forest of Costa Rica could give us a brand new insight,” into the rapid give-and-take in people’s conversations, says study coauthor Michael Long, a neuroscientist at New York University’s School of Medicine.
Quirks abound in these mice, known as Alston’s singing mice (Scotinomys teguina). Like famous singers with extreme green room demands, these mice are “kind of divas,” Long says, requiring larger terrariums, exercise equipment and a very special diet.
In the lab, standard mouse chow doesn’t cut it; instead, singing mice feast on fresh meal worm, dry cat food and fresh fruits and berries, says Bret Pasch. The biologist at Northern Arizona University in Flagstaff has studied these singing mice for years but wasn’t involved in this study.
(Excerpt) Read more at sciencenews.org ...
Starts at 3:09.
Ha!
I’m not impressed until they put together a barber shop quartet.
I hope the scientists gather enough of them to put on a decent performance of Handel’s Mousessiah in December
When?
Was someone, scientist or otherwise, confused about human conversation? I’d be glad to diagram a sentence or two for them. No mice required.
Like the ones in Cinderella?
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