ArticleProceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America2020
Sex differences in adult lifespan and aging rates of mortality across wild mammals.
Article in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 2020. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 135 papers, 2 of them syntheses 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
135 citing papers in PubMed, 2 syntheses or guidelines pooled it, 288 citations in OpenAlex.
- Stronger net selection on males across animals.eLife · 2021Pooled it
- Sexual dimorphism in trait variability and its eco-evolutionary and statistical implications.eLife · 2020Pooled it
- Multimodal single-cell omics analysis identifies epithelium-immune cell interactions and immune vulnerability associated with sex differences in COVID-19.Signal transduction and targeted therapy · 2021Trial
- Changes in transposable elements expression in male and female mice liver throughout aging.GeroScience · 2026Article
- A Comparative Analysis of Aging Across Causes of Death.Evolutionary applications · 2026Article
- Germ cells are hidden contributors to sex differences in vertebrate lifespan.The Journal of reproduction and development · 2026Review
- Leukocyte profiles reveal sex and age differences in immune investment in a polygynous bat.The Journal of animal ecology · 2026Article
- Temporal improvements in elephant longevity challenge the notion of compromised survival in zoos.Scientific reports · 2026Article
- Hunting Guild Mediates the Effects of Fecundity and Mortality on Sexual Size Dimorphism in Spiders.Ecology and evolution · 2026Article
- Menopause Averted a Midlife Energetic Crisis With Help From Older Dependent Children and Parents: A Simulation Study.American journal of biological anthropology · 2026Article
- Evolution of increased longevity and slowed ageing in a genus of tropical butterfly.Nature communications · 2026Article
- Time-restricted feeding extends healthspan in both sexes and lifespan in male C57BL/6 J mice.Nature aging · 2026Article
- Asymmetric life-history trade-offs shape sex-biased longevity patterns.Nature communications · 2026Article
- The rhythm of aging: Stability and drift in the individual rate of senescence.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2026Article
- Demographic causes and social consequences of adult sex ratio variation.Nature communications · 2026Article
- Epigenetic Signatures of Ageing in Asian Elephants Revealed by Reduced Representation Bisulphite Sequencing.Evolutionary applications · 2026Article
- Article
- Estropausal gut microbiota transplant improves measures of ovarian function in adult mice.Nature aging · 2026Article
- Fast females, slow males: accelerated ageing and reproductive senescence inEvolution letters · 2026Article
- Transcriptome analysis of ageing in a long-lived seabird reveals sex-specific differences across age classes in immune and DNA repair pathways.Frontiers in aging · 2026Article
75 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
14 authors at 7 institutions in 8 countries.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
In human populations, women consistently outlive men, which suggests profound biological foundations for sex differences in survival. Quantifying whether such sex differences are also pervasive in wild mammals is a crucial challenge in both evolutionary biology and biogerontology. Here, we compile demographic data from 134 mammal populations, encompassing 101 species, to show that the female's median lifespan is on average 18.6% longer than that of conspecific males, whereas in humans the female advantage is on average 7.8%. On the contrary, we do not find any consistent sex differences in aging rates. In addition, sex differences in median adult lifespan and aging rates are both highly variable across species. Our analyses suggest that the magnitude of sex differences in mammalian mortality patterns is likely shaped by local environmental conditions in interaction with the sex-specific costs of sexual selection.
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.