Domestic gardens as favorable pollinator habitats in impervious landscapes.

Urban expansion is correlated to negative biodiversity trends. The amount of impervious surfaces in urban areas is a determinant of pollinator species assemblages. While the increase in urbanization and impervious surfaces negatively impacts pollinators, cities also encompass urban green spaces, which have a significant capacity to support biodiversity.

Social grooming network in captive chimpanzees: does the wild or captive origin of group members affect sociality?

Many chimpanzees throughout the world are housed in captivity, and there is an increasing effort to recreate social groups by mixing individuals with captive origins with those with wild origins. Captive origins may entail restricted rearing conditions during early infant life, including, for example, no maternal rearing and a limited social life. Early rearing conditions have been linked with differences in tool-use behavior between captive- and wild-born chimpanzees.

Evidence that monkeys (Macaca tonkeana and Sapajus apella) read moves, but no evidence that they read goals.

Whereas most experiments indicate that monkeys have no theory of mind, a study carried out by Wood and collaborators (2007) claimed that they can make inferences about the intentions of another individual. We applied the experimental procedure devised by these authors to investigate whether monkeys can recognize goal-directed actions. We tested 16 Tonkean macaques (Macaca tonkeana) and 12 tufted capuchin monkeys (Sapajus apella).

Social networks in primates: smart and tolerant species have more efficient networks.

Network optimality has been described in genes, proteins and human communicative networks. In the latter, optimality leads to the efficient transmission of information with a minimum number of connections. Whilst studies show that differences in centrality exist in animal networks with central individuals having higher fitness, network efficiency has never been studied in animal groups.

Lack of evidence that Tonkean macaques understand what others can hear.

By distinguishing the attentional cues of their mates, animals can learn what part of their environment is of potential interest. However, recognizing the attentional states of others through auditory perception appears to be difficult, since these states are generally not accompanied by ostensive signals liable to reveal them. In this context, one study found that rhesus macaques withhold their action when unobserved, then concluding that they know what others can hear.