Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences
Published April 3, 2019 | 17:01 EDT (Brief from the Royal Society)
If we fall apart as we age because we allocate so much energy to trying to reproduce that we don’t look after our bodies, then males that have to compete more vigorously should age faster. In this study of a cricket population in a Spanish meadow where years vary in the relative numbers of males and females, males in years with more competition did age faster. Even male insects pay the costs of reproductive competition in later life.
Canadian co-author: David Fisher, McMaster University – fished3@mcmaster.ca
