Biology & Life Sciences

Slice of PLOS: The Awesomeness of Bats

Published June 8, 2016 Curated Collections

Just how awesome are bats? It’s easy to forget that one in five species of mammal on this planet have wings capable of delivering spectacularly acrobatic flying abilities. Equally incredibly, two-thirds of these 1,200 species of flying mammals can fly in the dark, using exquisite echolocation to avoid obstacles and snatch airborne prey with stunning deftness. This Slice of PLOS highlights papers from across the PLOS journals that explain the science behind The Awesomeness of Bats.

Image Credit: shellac, flickr.com

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Slice of PLOS: The Awesomeness of Bats

Slice of PLOS: The Awesomeness of Bats

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shellac, flickr.com

Biologue Slice of PLOS: The Awesomeness of Bats
December 21, 2015 Roli Roberts
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Brian Geisen

PLOS Biology How Bats Land Upside Down
November 16, 2015 Robin Meadows
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10.1371/journal.pbio.1002297

PLOS Biology Falling with Style: Bats Perform Complex Aerial Rotations by Adjusting Wing Inertia
November 16, 2015 Attila J. Bergou, Sharon M. Swartz, Hamid Vejdani, Daniel K. Riskin, Lauren Reimnitz, Gabriel Taubin, Kenneth S. Breuer
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10.1371/journal.pcbi.1004484

PLOS Computational Biology Sensorimotor Model of Obstacle Avoidance in Echolocating Bats
October 26, 2015 Dieter Vanderelst, Marc W. Holderied, Herbert Peremans
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10.1371/journal.pone.0118545

PLOS ONE The Aerodynamic Cost of Head Morphology in Bats: Maybe Not as Bad as It Seems
March 4, 2015 Dieter Vanderelst, Herbert Peremans, Norizham Abdul Razak, Edouard Verstraelen, Greg Dimitriadis
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10.1371/journal.pbio.1002046

PLOS Biology A Sensory-Motor Control Model of Animal Flight Explains Why Bats Fly Differently in Light Versus Dark
January 28, 2015 Nadav S. Bar, Sigurd Skogestad, Jose M. Marçal, Nachum Ulanovsky, Yossi Yovel
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10.1371/journal.pcbi.1004089

PLOS Computational Biology Delayed Response and Biosonar Perception Explain Movement Coordination in Trawling Bats
March 26, 2015 Luca Giuggioli, Thomas J. McKetterick, Marc Holderied
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10.1371/journal.pone.0135590

PLOS ONE Bidirectional Echolocation in the Bat Barbastella barbastellus: Different Signals of Low Source Level Are Emitted Upward through the Nose and Downward through the Mouth
September 9, 2015 Anna-Maria Seibert, Jens C. Koblitz, Annette Denzinger, Hans-Ulrich Schnitzler
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10.1371/journal.pone.0131825

PLOS ONE Managing Conflict between Bats and Humans: The Response of Soprano Pipistrelles (Pipistrellus pygmaeus) to Exclusion from Roosts in Houses
August 5, 2015 Emma Stone, Matt R. K. Zeale, Stuart E. Newson, William J. Browne, Stephen Harris, Gareth Jones
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10.1371/journal.pone.0121329

PLOS ONE Bacteria Isolated from Bats Inhibit the Growth of Pseudogymnoascus destructans, the Causative Agent of White-Nose Syndrome
April 8, 2015 Joseph R. Hoyt, Tina L. Cheng, Kate E. Langwig, Mallory M. Hee, Winifred F. Frick, A. Marm Kilpatrick
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10.1371/journal.ppat.1004819

PLOS Pathogens Expected and Unexpected Features of the Newly Discovered Bat Influenza A-like Viruses
June 4, 2015 Wenjun Ma, Adolfo García-Sastre, Martin Schwemmle