ArticlePeerJ2015
Sloths like it hot: ambient temperature modulates food intake in the brown-throated sloth (Bradypus variegatus).
Article in PeerJ, 2015. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 13 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
13 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it, 25 citations in OpenAlex.
- Arboreal Mammals Are at Risk Under Climate Change: Insights From a Global Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis.Global change biology · 2026Pooled it
- Does energy minimisation constrain behavioural plasticity? Long-term activity budgets of a model folivore-frugivore.The Journal of animal ecology · 2026Article
- Differential Microbial Composition and Fiber Degradation in Two Sloth Species (Bradypus variegatus and Choloepus hoffmanni).Current microbiology · 2025Article
- Metabolic skinflint or spendthrift? Insights into ground sloth integument and thermophysiology revealed by biophysical modeling and clumped isotope paleothermometry.Journal of mammalian evolution · 2025Article
- Fatal gastric amebiasis in a Linnaeus's two-toed sloth associated withJournal of veterinary diagnostic investigation : official publication of the American Association of Veterinary Laboratory Diagnosticians, Inc · 2024Article
- Nutritive Value and Degradation Kinetic Parameters of Three Plants for FeedingAnimals : an open access journal from MDPI · 2024Article
- Article
- Article
- Myology of the pelvic limb of the brown-throated three-toed sloth (Bradypus variegatus).Journal of anatomy · 2022Article
- Coming to grips with life upside down: how myosin fiber type and metabolic properties of sloth hindlimb muscles contribute to suspensory function.Journal of comparative physiology. B, Biochemical, systemic, and environmental physiology · 2021Article
- Genetic divergence and evidence of human-mediated translocation of two-fingered sloths (CEvolutionary applications · 2020Article
- A Horse of a Different Color?: Tensile Strength and Elasticity of Sloth Flexor Tendons.Integrative organismal biology (Oxford, England) · 2020Article
- The metabolic response of thePeerJ · 2018Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
4 authors at 2 institutions in 2 countries.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Sloths are considered to have one of the lowest mass-specific metabolic rates of any mammal and, in tandem with a slow digestive rate, have been theorized to have correspondingly low rates of ingestion. Here, we show in a study conducted over five months, that three captive Bradypus variegatus (Brown-throated sloths) had a remarkably low mean food intake of 17 g kg(-1)day(-1) (SD 4.2). Food consumption was significantly affected by ambient temperature, with increased intake at higher temperatures. We suggest that the known fluctuation of sloth core body temperature with ambient temperature affects the rate at which gut fauna process digesta, allowing for increased rates of fermentation at higher temperatures. Since Bradypus sloths maintain a constantly full stomach, faster rates of fermentation should enhance digestive throughput, increasing the capacity for higher levels of food intake, thereby allowing increased energy acquisition at higher ambient temperatures. This contrasts with other mammals, which tend to show increased levels of food intake in colder conditions, and points to the importance of temperature in regulating all aspects of energy use in sloths.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.