ReviewPhilosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences2020
Conceptual developments in sperm competition: a very brief synopsis.
Review in Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences, 2020. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 36 papers.
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
36 citing papers in PubMed, 92 citations in OpenAlex.
- Genes Related to Sperm Motility Are Under Recent Ongoing Selection in Two Shorebird Species With a Polygynous Mating System and Frequent Multiple Paternity.Molecular ecology · 2026Article
- Variation in Eusperm Length May Reflect Reproductive Barriers and Differences in Sperm Competition Intensity AmongEcology and evolution · 2025Article
- Reproductive Transitions and Sperm Utilisation in a Facultatively Parthenogenetic Stick Insect.Ecology and evolution · 2025Article
- What matters to a mouse? Effects of internal and external context on male vocal response to female squeaks.PloS one · 2025Article
- CCDC113 stabilizes sperm axoneme and head-tail coupling apparatus to ensure male fertility.eLife · 2024Article
- Article
- An Orphan Gene Enhances Male Reproductive Success in Plutella xylostella.Molecular biology and evolution · 2024Article
- Population density effects on gamete traits and fertilisation dynamics under varying sperm environments in mussels.Ecology and evolution · 2024Article
- Copulation Duration and Sperm Precedence with Reference to Larval Diapause Induction inInsects · 2024Article
- Evolutionary trade-offs between testes size and parenting in Neotropical glassfrogs.Proceedings. Biological sciences · 2024Article
- Spermbots and Their Applications in Assisted Reproduction: Current Progress and Future Perspectives.International journal of nanomedicine · 2024Review
- Article
- Female reproductive fluid and male seminal fluid: a non-gametic conflict for post-mating control.Biology letters · 2023Article
- Thousands of Pristionchus pacificus orphan genes were integrated into developmental networks that respond to diverse environmental microbiota.PLoS genetics · 2023Article
- Evolutionary game theory of continuous traits from a causal perspective.Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · 2023Article
- Frequency-dependent viscosity of salmon ovarian fluid has biophysical implications for sperm-egg interactions.The Journal of experimental biology · 2023Article
- Characterization of sperm and implications for male fertility in the last of the Rhynchocephalians.Conservation physiology · 2023Article
- On the Origin and Evolution of Sperm Cells.Cells · 2022Article
- Article
- Intrinsic emergence and modulation of sex-specific dominance reversals in threshold traits.Evolution; international journal of organic evolution · 2022Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
1 author at 1 institution in 1 country.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
The past half century has seen the development of the field of post-ejaculatory sexual selection, the sequel to sexual selection for mate-acquisition (pre-ejaculatory) described by Darwin. In richness and diversity of adaptations, post-ejaculatory selection rivals that of pre-ejaculatory sexual selection. Anisogamy-and hence two sexes-likely arose by primeval gamete competition, and sperm competition remains a major force maintaining high sperm numbers. The post-ejaculatory equivalent of male-male competition for matings, sperm competition was an intense ancestral form of sexual selection, typically weakening as mobility and internal fertilization developed in many taxa, when some expenditure became diverted into pre-ejaculatory competition. Sperm competition theory has been relatively successful in explaining variation in relative testes size and sperm numbers per ejaculate and is becoming more successful in explaining variation in sperm phenotype. Sperm competition has generated many other male adaptations such as seminal fluid proteins that variously modify female reproduction towards male interests, and copulatory plugs, prolonged copulations and post-ejaculatory guarding behaviour that reduce female remating probability, many of which result in sexual conflict. This short survey of conceptual developments is intended as a broad overview, mainly as a primer for new researchers. This article is part of the theme issue 'Fifty years of sperm competition'.
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.