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Social synchronization of circadian rhythmicity in female mice depends on the
number of cohabiting animals
#MMPMID26063754
Paul MJ
; Indic P
; Schwartz WJ
Biol Lett
2015[Jun]; 11
(6
): 20150204
PMID26063754
show ga
Communal animals often engage in group activities that require temporal synchrony
among its members, including synchrony on the circadian timescale. The principles
and conditions that foster such collective synchronization are not understood,
but existing literature hints that the number of interacting individuals may be a
critical factor. We tested this by recording individual circadian body
temperature rhythms of female house mice housed singly, in twos (pairs), or in
groups of five (quintets) in constant darkness; determining the daily phases of
the circadian peak for each animal; and then calculating the cycle-to-cycle phase
relationship between cohabiting animals over time. Significant temporal coherence
was observed in quintets: the proportion of quintets (4/7), but not pairs (2/8),
that became synchronized was greater than could be achieved by the complete
simulated reassortment of all individuals. We speculate that the social coupling
of individual circadian clocks of group members may be adaptive under certain
conditions, and we propose that optimal group sizes in nature may depend not only
on species-specific energetics, spatial behaviour and natural history but also on
the mathematics of synchronizing assemblies of weakly coupled animal oscillators.
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