Butterflies lose their navigational capabilities. You can guess why

In every fall, millions of butterflies migrate to the King of North America, up to 3000 miles south to the Mountains of the Central Mexico, and then return to the northern term in the spring. These winged insects depend on a complex navigation system to go to and from their locations over the winter, and new research indicates that climate change may tamper with it.

The monarchy butterflies have two distinct “biological” biocalats. The primary trend is raised on the basis of their daily rhythm and the position of the sun, but in the days of clouds, they turn into a backup compass that provokes the direction of the Earth’s magnetic field. Scientists have already known that seasonal temperatures play an important role in calibrating these vital navigational mechanisms during autumn migration, but they were not sure whether the rules themselves apply to spring migration. A new study published on Wednesday August 13, in the magazine Plos one He emphasized that they are doing this, indicating that the high temperatures in the winter in Mexico can prevent kings from returning to the northern term.

“The question was, if they were using the sun’s compass or magnetic compass to go to the south, would they use the same type of compass mechanisms to return to the north? We were not sure of what raised this,” this raised this. “

When the temperatures decrease in the fall, this shift calibrates both the biological compasses of the butterflies to indicate the south, and direct them towards their excessive positions in Mexico. “Once they get there, they mainly wander in the refrigerator,” he explained. His previous research Show This long period of exposure to cold temperatures re -calibrates the sun’s compass to indicate the north so that you can direct the kings to the summer group in the spring. In this new study, he and his colleagues have achieved whether this is also true for the magnetic compass.

To this end, the researchers conducted a series of correct response experiences with migrant and non -immigrant kings. During these experiments, the butterflies were subjected to artificial magnetic fields that mimic geographical conditions south of their positions over the winter, and then placed until they were upside down. When correcting themselves, the non -immigrant kings faced magnetic north, while the migrant kings faced the magnetic south. This indicated that the kings show something similar to the migrant insomnia – a coercion to go towards the direction that tell them their migratory instincts to follow up even if they could not fly there already there.

With this, other than his colleagues cooled the kings to deceive their bodies to believe that they had gone through a winter period. When they conducted the correct response experiments again, the migrant kings pointed to the magnetic north. However, the non -immigrant kings still point to the magnetic south.

“This told us that, just like the sun’s compass, the magnetic compass is re -calibrated due to the cold conditions that are consistent with the presence in Mexico while it is in the winter,” he explained. “That is why this type of hammer in the house where their ability to fully move to the environmental conditions it suffers from.”

He greenhouse gas emissions are more than average temperatures all over the world, including in the range of military butterflies. Joa and his colleagues already knew that this threatened the initial movement mechanism, but their new study indicates that the backup mechanism is in danger as well. If the temperatures are very warm, kings may lose the ability to return to the northern term in the spring. Determining the minimum temperatures of the kings who need to re -calibrate the biological infections of spring migration will require more research, but these results emphasize the threat that climate change poses this type.