ArticleZoological letters2025
Photo-refractoriness reflects bet-hedging strategies deployed in unpredictable environments in male Brandt's voles.
Article in Zoological letters, 2025. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Not yet cited in PubMed.
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
0 citing papers in PubMed.
No citing paper in PubMed yet.
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
6 authors.
Funding
Abstract
Day length, also known as photoperiod, is an important reproductive regulatory factor in most seasonal breeders. Brandt's vole, a long-day breeder, exhibits significant differentces in reproductive development depending on the photoperiod of the season of birth, as is seen in other rodent seasonal breeders. However, there is a lack of comprehensive studies on the effects of photoperiod across different seasons. In the present study, we investigated the impact of long (LP) and short photoperiod (SP) on postnatal development in male voles. We measured somatic and testicular parameters from weaning at three postnatal weeks (PNW3) to PNW19, weighed testis mass from birth, and confirmed the status of testicular development by observing the histological features of the seminiferous epithelium. The results showed no difference in testis mass between LP and SP males up to PNW3, with normal initiation of intratubular meiosis and the presence of leptotene/zygotene spermatocytes in both groups. From PNW4 to PNW10, SP males displayed slower growth in both somatic and testicular parameters and showed suppressed development of primary spermatocytes and Leydig cells compared to LP males. After PNW10, both groups experienced photo-refractoriness, characterized by a reversal of gonadal activity. During this stage, SP voles spontaneously initiated gonadal development and resumed the meiotic process, while LP males showed testicular degeneration accompanied by a progressive loss of germ cells ranging from spermatids to primary spermatocytes. Until PNW19, both groups reached similar testis size and mass. Interestingly, this refractoriness was observed in only half of the males in each group, suggesting a bet-hedging survival strategy that allows populations to cope with unpredictable environmental changes, such as fluctuations in temperature and food. These findings highlight the importance of photoperiod as a key environmental factor in influencing sexual maturation in young Brandt's voles, and indicate that the impact of photoperiod in adult voles can be flexible in vole adulthood, varying according to their natural life cycle. This suggests a bet-hedging survival strategy of photo-refractoriness with complex interactions between environmental cues and life history traits.
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.