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Cannibal
Cannibalism is the act of consuming another individual of the same species as food. Cannibalism is a common ecological interaction in the animal kingdom and has been recorded in more than 1,500 species. Human cannibalism is well documented, both in ancient and in recent times. The rate of cannibalism increases in nutritionally poor environments as individuals turn to members of their own species as an additional food source.Elgar, M.A. & Crespi, B.J. (1992) ''Cannibalism: ecology and evolution among diverse taxa'', Oxford University Press, Oxford ngland New York. Cannibalism regulates population numbers, whereby resources such as food, shelter and territory become more readily available with the decrease of potential competition. Although it may benefit the individual, it has been shown that the presence of cannibalism decreases the expected survival rate of the whole population and increases the risk of consuming a relative. Other negative effects may include the increased ri ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Human Cannibalism
Human cannibalism is the act or practice of humans eating the flesh or internal organs of other human beings. A person who practices cannibalism is called a cannibal. The meaning of "cannibalism" has been extended into zoology to describe an individual of a species consuming all or part of another individual of the same species as food, including sexual cannibalism. The Island Carib people of the Lesser Antilles, from whom the word "cannibalism" is derived, acquired a long-standing reputation as cannibals after their legends were recorded in the 17th century. Some controversy exists over the accuracy of these legends and the prevalence of actual cannibalism in the culture. Cannibalism was practiced in New Guinea and in parts of the Solomon Islands, and flesh markets existed in some parts of Melanesia. Fiji was once known as the "Cannibal Isles". Cannibalism has been well documented in much of the world, including Fiji, the Amazon Basin, the Congo, and the Māori people ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sexual Cannibalism
Sexual cannibalism is when an animal, usually the female, cannibalizes its mate prior to, during, or after copulation.Polis, G.A. & Farley, R.D. Behavior and Ecology of Mating in the journal of Arachnology 33-46 (1979). It is a trait observed in many arachnid orders and several insect orders. Several hypotheses to explain this seemingly paradoxical behavior have been proposed. The adaptive foraging hypothesis,Blamires, S.J. Nutritional implications for sexual cannibalism in a sexually dimorphic orb web spider. Austral Ecology 36, 389-394 (2011). aggressive spillover hypothesisArnqvist, G. Courtship behaviour and sexual cannibalism in the semi-aquatic fishing spider, DOLOMEDES FIMBRIATUS (CLERCK) (ARANEAE: PISAURIDAE).pdf. The journal of Arachnology 20, 222-226 (1992). and mistaken identity hypothesisGould, S. Only his wings remained. Natural History 93, 10-18 (1984). are among the proposed hypotheses to explain how sexual cannibalism evolved. This behavior is believed to have evol ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Endocannibalism
Endocannibalism is a practice of cannibalism in one's own locality or community. Endocannibalism has also been used to describe the consumption of relics in a mortuary context. As a cultural practice Herodotus (3.38) mentions funerary cannibalism among the ''Callatiae'', a tribe of India. It is believed that some South American indigenous cultures, such as the Mayoruna people, practiced endocannibalism in the past. The Amahuaca Indians of Peru picked particles of bone out of the ashes of a cremation fire, ground them with corn, and drank as a kind of gruel. For the Wari' people in western Brazil, endocannibalism was an act of compassion where the roasted remains of fellow Wari' were consumed in a mortuary setting; ideally, the affines (relatives by marriage) would consume the entire corpse, and rejecting the practice would be offensive to the direct family members. Ya̧nomamö consumed the ground-up bones and ashes of cremated kinsmen in an act of mourning; this is still clas ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Kuru (disease)
Kuru is a rare, incurable, and fatal neurodegenerative disorder that was formerly common among the Fore people of Papua New Guinea. Kuru is a form of transmissible spongiform encephalopathy (TSE) caused by the transmission of abnormally folded proteins (prions), which leads to symptoms such as tremors and loss of coordination from neurodegeneration. The term kuru derives from the Fore word ''kuria'' or ''guria'' ("to shake"), due to the body tremors that are a classic symptom of the disease. ''Kúru'' itself means "trembling". It is also known as the "laughing sickness" due to the pathologic bursts of laughter which are a symptom of the disease. It is now widely accepted that kuru was transmitted among members of the Fore tribe of Papua New Guinea via funerary cannibalism. Deceased family members were traditionally cooked and eaten, which was thought to help free the spirit of the dead. Women and children usually consumed the brain, the organ in which infectious prions were m ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Scavenger
Scavengers are animals that consume dead organisms that have died from causes other than predation or have been killed by other predators. While scavenging generally refers to carnivores feeding on carrion, it is also a herbivorous feeding behavior. Scavengers play an important role in the ecosystem by consuming dead animal and plant material. ''Decomposers'' and detritivores complete this process, by consuming the remains left by scavengers. Scavengers aid in overcoming fluctuations of food resources in the environment. The process and rate of scavenging is affected by both biotic and abiotic factors, such as carcass size, habitat, temperature, and seasons. Etymology Scavenger is an alteration of ''scavager,'' from Middle English ''skawager'' meaning "customs collector", from ''skawage'' meaning "customs", from Old North French ''escauwage'' meaning "inspection", from ''schauwer'' meaning "to inspect", of Germanic origin; akin to Old English ''scēawian'' and Germa ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Fletcher's Frog
Fletcher's frog (''Platyplectrum fletcheri''), commonly known as the sandpaper frog or black-soled frog, is a species of nocturnal, terrestrial frog native to eastern Australia. It is primarily found in wet sclerophyll forests along mountain ranges and the coast. The Fletcher's frog's breeding behavior revolves around ephemeral water bodies created by rainfall. Male frogs compete with one another over territories that contain these pools, while female frogs choose desirable males to mate with. Female frogs produce foam and lay their eggs within the frothy mass. The nest's mucus has protective properties that enhance the survival odds of the progeny. Because ephemeral environments are resource-poor, sandpaper frog tadpoles rely primarily on the cannibalism of conspecific eggs to satisfy their nutritional needs. The Fletcher frog's post-metamorphic life revolves around foraging for food in leaf litter and searching for mates. The Fletcher frog is semelparous species, mating and l ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Papua New Guinea
Papua New Guinea (abbreviated PNG; , ; tpi, Papua Niugini; ho, Papua Niu Gini), officially the Independent State of Papua New Guinea ( tpi, Independen Stet bilong Papua Niugini; ho, Independen Stet bilong Papua Niu Gini), is a country in Oceania that comprises the eastern half of the island of New Guinea and its offshore islands in Melanesia (a region of the southwestern Pacific Ocean north of Australia). Its capital, located along its southeastern coast, is Port Moresby. The country is the world's third largest island country, with an area of . At the national level, after being ruled by three external powers since 1884, including nearly 60 years of Australian administration starting during World War I, Papua New Guinea established its sovereignty in 1975. It became an independent Commonwealth realm in 1975 with Elizabeth II as its queen. It also became a member of the Commonwealth of Nations in its own right. There are 839 known languages of Papua New Guinea ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Tadpole
A tadpole is the larval stage in the biological life cycle of an amphibian. Most tadpoles are fully aquatic, though some species of amphibians have tadpoles that are terrestrial. Tadpoles have some fish-like features that may not be found in adult amphibians such as a lateral line, gills and swimming tails. As they undergo metamorphosis, they start to develop functional lungs for breathing air, and the diet of tadpoles changes drastically. A few amphibians, such as some members of the frog family Brevicipitidae, undergo direct development i.e., they do not undergo a free-living larval stage as tadpoles instead emerging from eggs as fully formed "froglet" miniatures of the adult morphology. Some other species hatch into tadpoles underneath the skin of the female adult or are kept in a pouch until after metamorphosis. Having no hard skeletons, it might be expected that tadpole fossils would not exist. However, traces of biofilms have been preserved and fossil tadpoles have ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Parasitism
Parasitism is a close relationship between species, where one organism, the parasite, lives on or inside another organism, the host, causing it some harm, and is adapted structurally to this way of life. The entomologist E. O. Wilson has characterised parasites as "predators that eat prey in units of less than one". Parasites include single-celled protozoans such as the agents of malaria, sleeping sickness, and amoebic dysentery; animals such as hookworms, lice, mosquitoes, and vampire bats; fungi such as honey fungus and the agents of ringworm; and plants such as mistletoe, dodder, and the broomrapes. There are six major parasitic strategies of exploitation of animal hosts, namely parasitic castration, directly transmitted parasitism (by contact), trophicallytransmitted parasitism (by being eaten), vector-transmitted parasitism, parasitoidism, and micropredation. One major axis of classification concerns invasiveness: an endoparasite lives inside the hos ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Kin Recognition
Kin recognition, also called kin detection, is an organism's ability to distinguish between close genetic kin and non-kin. In evolutionary biology and psychology, such an ability is presumed to have evolved for inbreeding avoidance, though animals do not typically avoid inbreeding. An additional adaptive function sometimes posited for kin recognition is a role in kin selection. There is debate over this, since in strict theoretical terms kin recognition is not necessary for kin selection or the cooperation associated with it. Rather, social behaviour can emerge by kin selection in the demographic conditions of 'viscous populations' with organisms interacting in their natal context, without active kin discrimination, since social participants by default typically share recent common origin. Since kin selection theory emerged, much research has been produced investigating the possible role of kin recognition mechanisms in mediating altruism. Taken as a whole, this research suggests th ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
A Lusitanicus Cannibalizing
A, or a, is the first letter and the first vowel of the Latin alphabet, used in the modern English alphabet, the alphabets of other western European languages and others worldwide. Its name in English is ''a'' (pronounced ), plural ''aes''. It is similar in shape to the Ancient Greek letter alpha, from which it derives. The uppercase version consists of the two slanting sides of a triangle, crossed in the middle by a horizontal bar. The lowercase version can be written in two forms: the double-storey a and single-storey ɑ. The latter is commonly used in handwriting and fonts based on it, especially fonts intended to be read by children, and is also found in italic type. In English grammar, " a", and its variant " an", are indefinite articles. History The earliest certain ancestor of "A" is aleph (also written 'aleph), the first letter of the Phoenician alphabet, which consisted entirely of consonants (for that reason, it is also called an abjad to distinguish it fr ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Coprophagia
Coprophagia () or coprophagy () is the consumption of feces. The word is derived from the grc, κόπρος , "feces" and , "to eat". Coprophagy refers to many kinds of feces-eating, including eating feces of other species (heterospecifics), of other individuals (allocoprophagy), or one's own (autocoprophagy) – those once deposited or taken directly from the anus. In humans, coprophagia has been described since the late 19th century in individuals with mental illnesses and in some sexual acts, such as the practices of rimming and felching where sex partners insert their tongue into each other's anus and ingest biologically significant amounts of feces. Some animal species eat feces as a normal behavior, in particular lagomorphs, which do so to allow tough plant materials to be digested more thoroughly by passing twice through the digestive tract. Other species may eat feces under certain conditions. Coprophagia by humans In cuisine The feces of the rock ptarmigan is ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
