Projektnummer

0057518

Zusammenfassung

Recognising close relatives has valuable evolutionary advantages, helping individuals to avoid costs of maladaptive inbreeding. The fact that body odours can be used to identify even unfamiliar kin points to the existence of covariation between genetic relatedness and odour similarity. Body odours consist of complex mixtures of chemicals from different sources and are modified by skin bacteria and other microbes. Using a songbird, the zebra finch (Taeniopygia guttata), this project aims to investigate the impact of skin microbe communities on individual body odours and how these microb...