Biology subjects

Haba, Y.

Publications and source records attributed to Haba, Y..

5 recordsLinked to original sources

bioRxiv2026

Spontaneous behavior predicts colony membership, individual identity, and rank in naked mole-rat societies

Animal societies are organized across scales, from moment-to-moment actions of individuals to dynamic group structure. A central challenge in sociobiology is to understand how behaviors of individuals shape group structure. Here, using machine vision to map recurrent fine-scale behavioral modules in the eusocial naked mole-rat (Heterocephalus glaber), we show that spontaneous behavior in isolation predicts group-level social organization, including colony membership and individual identity. We determined dominance relationships and found highly linear hierarchies, with ranks stable over months to years. Remarkably, fine-scale behavioral profiles in isolation correctly predicted pairwise dominance relationships, allowing reconstruction of rank order within each colony. Models trained within one colony predicted rank poorly in others, suggesting that naked mole-rats express social position through behavioral patterns specific to each colony. Together, our results connect fine-scale behavior to social structure maintained over years and show that, even when an animal is alone, its behavior carries signatures of its identity, colony, and place within that society.

animal behavior and cognition↗

bioRxiv2025

Ancient origin of an urban underground mosquito

Understanding how life is adapting to urban environments represents an important challenge in evolutionary biology. Here we investigate a widely cited example of urban adaptation, Culex pipiens form molestus, also known as the London Underground Mosquito. Population genomic analysis of [~]350 contemporary and historical samples counter the popular hypothesis that molestus originated belowground in London less than 200 years ago. Instead, we show that molestus first adapted to human environments aboveground in the Middle East over the course of >1000 years, likely in concert with the rise of agricultural civilizations. Our results highlight the role of early human society in priming taxa for contemporary urban evolution and have important implications for understanding arbovirus transmission.

evolutionary biology↗

bioRxiv2023

Synchrony of Bird Migration with Avian Influenza Global Spread; Implications for Vulnerable Bird Orders

Highly pathogenic avian influenza virus (HPAIV) A H5 clade 2.3.4.4 has caused worldwide outbreaks in domestic poultry, occasional spillover to humans, and increasing deaths of diverse species of wild birds since 2014. Wild bird migration is currently acknowledged as an important ecological process contributing to the global dispersal of HPAIV H5. However, it is unclear how seasonal bird migration facilitates global virus dispersal, and which avian species are exposed to HPAI H5 clade 2.3.4.4 viruses and where. To shed light on ongoing global outbreaks, we sought to explore these questions through phylodynamic analyses based on empirical data of bird movement tracking and virus genome sequences. First, based on viral phylogeography and bird migration networks, we demonstrate that seasonal bird migration can explain salient features of the global dispersal of clade 2.3.4.4. Second, we detect synchrony between the seasonality of bird annual cycle phases and virus lineage movements. We reveal the differing vulnerable bird orders at geographical origins and destinations of HPAIV H5 lineage movements. Notably, we highlight the potential importance of relatively under-discussed Suliformes and Ciconiiformes, in addition to Anseriformes and Charadriiformes, in virus lineage movements. Our study provides a phylodynamic framework that links the bird movement ecology and genomic epidemiology of avian influenza; it highlights the importance of integrating bird behaviour and life history in avian influenza studies.

ecology↗

bioRxiv2019

A multivariate phylogenetic comparative method incorporating a flexible function between discrete and continuous traits

One major challenge of using the phylogenetic comparative method (PCM) is the analysis of the evolution of interrelated continuous and discrete traits in a single multivariate statistical framework. In addition, more intricate parameters such as branch-specific directional selection have rarely been integrated into such multivariate PCM frameworks. Here, originally motivated to analyze the complex evolutionary trajectories of group size (continuous variable) and social systems (discrete variable) in African subterranean rodents, we develop a flexible approach using approximate Bayesian computation (ABC). Specifically, our multivariate ABC-PCM method allows the user to flexibly model an underlying latent evolutionary function between continuous and discrete traits. The ABC-PCM also simultaneously incorporates complex evolutionary parameters such as branch-specific selection. This study highlights the flexibility of ABC-PCMs in analyzing the evolution of phenotypic traits interrelated in a complex manner.

evolutionary biology↗

bioRxiv2016

Repeated losses of PRDM9-directed recombination despite the conservation of PRDM9 across vertebrates

Studies of highly diverged species have revealed two mechanisms by which meiotic recombination is directed to the genome--through PRDM9 binding or by targeting promoter-like features--that lead to dramatically different evolutionary dynamics of hotspots. Here, we identify PRDM9 orthologs from genome and transcriptome data in 225 species. We find the complete PRDM9 ortholog across distantly related vertebrates but, despite this broad conservation, infer a minimum of six partial and three complete losses. Strikingly, taxa carrying the complete ortholog of PRDM9 are precisely those with rapid evolution of its predicted binding affinity, suggesting that all domains are necessary for directing recombination. Indeed, as we show, swordtail fish carrying only a partial but conserved ortholog share recombination properties with PRDM9 knock-outs.

evolutionary biology↗