Wood, Brian M.;
Negrey, Jacob D.;
Brown, Janine L.;
Deschner, Tobias;
Thompson, Melissa Emery;
Gunter, Sholly;
Mitani, John C.;
Watts, David P.;
Langergraber, Kevin E.
Demographic and hormonal evidence for menopause in wild chimpanzees
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Media type:
E-Article
Title:
Demographic and hormonal evidence for menopause in wild chimpanzees
Contributor:
Wood, Brian M.;
Negrey, Jacob D.;
Brown, Janine L.;
Deschner, Tobias;
Thompson, Melissa Emery;
Gunter, Sholly;
Mitani, John C.;
Watts, David P.;
Langergraber, Kevin E.
imprint:
American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), 2023
Published in:Science
Language:
English
DOI:
10.1126/science.add5473
ISSN:
0036-8075;
1095-9203
Origination:
Footnote:
Description:
<jats:p>Among mammals, post-reproductive life spans are currently documented only in humans and a few species of toothed whales. Here we show that a post-reproductive life span exists among wild chimpanzees in the Ngogo community of Kibale National Park, Uganda. Post-reproductive representation was 0.195, indicating that a female who reached adulthood could expect to live about one-fifth of her adult life in a post-reproductive state, around half as long as human hunter-gatherers. Post-reproductive females exhibited hormonal signatures of menopause, including sharply increasing gonadotropins after age 50. We discuss whether post-reproductive life spans in wild chimpanzees occur only rarely, as a short-term response to favorable ecological conditions, or instead are an evolved species-typical trait as well as the implications of these alternatives for our understanding of the evolution of post-reproductive life spans.</jats:p>