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952 results for “Noise”
Test dataset for separation of speech, traffic sounds, wind noise, and general sounds
<p>The dataset was generated as part of the paper:<br> Deep Complex U-Net Ensemble for Outdoor Urban Sound Source Separation,<br> K. Arendt, A. Szumaczuk, B. Jasik, P. Masztalski, K. Piaskowski, M. Matuszewski, K. Nowicki, P. Zborowski.</p> <p>It contains various sounds from the Audio Set [1] and spoken utterances from VCTK [2] and DNS [3] datasets.</p> <p>Contents:<br> sr_8k/<br> mix_clean/<br> s1/<br> s2/<br> s3/<br> s4/<br> sr_16k/<br> mix_clean/<br> s1/<br> s2/<br> s3/<br> s4/<br> sr_48k/<br> mix_clean/<br> s1/<br> s2/<br> s3/<br> s4/</p> <p>Each directory contains 512 audio samples in different sampling rate (sr_8k - 8 kHz, sr_16k - 16 kHz, sr_48k - 48 kHz).<br> The audio samples for each sampling rate are different as they were generated randomly and separately.<br> Each directory contains 5 subdirectories:<br> - mix_clean - mixed sources,<br> - s1 - source #1 (general sounds),<br> - s2 - source #2 (speech),<br> - s3 - source #3 (traffic sounds),<br> - s4 - source #4 (wind noise).</p> <p>The sound mixtures were generated by adding s2, s3, s4 to s1 with SNR ranging from -10 to 10 dB w.r.t. s1.</p> <p><br> REFERENCES:</p> <p>[1] Jort F. Gemmeke, Daniel P. W. Ellis, Dylan Freedman,<br> Aren Jansen, Wade Lawrence, R. Channing Moore,<br> Manoj Plakal, and Marvin Ritter, “Audio set: An ontology<br> and human-labeled dataset for audio events,” in<br> Proc. IEEE ICASSP 2017, New Orleans, LA, 2017.</p> <p>[2] Christophe Veaux, Junichi Yamagishi, and Kirsten Mac-<br> Donald, “CSTR VCTK corpus: English multi-speaker<br> corpus for CSTR voice cloning toolkit, [sound],”<br> https://doi.org/10.7488/ds/1994, University of Edinburgh.<br> The Centre for Speech Technology Research<br> (CSTR). 2017.</p> <p>[3] Chandan K. A. Reddy, Ebrahim Beyrami, Harishchandra<br> Dubey, Vishak Gopal, Roger Cheng, Ross Cutler,<br> Sergiy Matusevych, Robert Aichner, Ashkan Aazami,<br> Sebastian Braun, Puneet Rana, Sriram Srinivasan, and<br> Johannes Gehrke, “The interspeech 2020 deep noise<br> suppression challenge: Datasets, subjective speech<br> quality and testing framework,” 2020.</p>
Data and code for: River noise alters orb-weaving spider abundance, web size, and prey capture
<p>Novel anthropogenic noise has received considerable attention in behavioral ecology, but natural acoustic environments have largely been ignored as ecological niche axes. In riparian sites, within an arid sagebrush steppe ecosystem, we use a natural range of acoustic environments along with experimentally broadcasted whitewater river noise to test our hypothesis that river noise is an important niche axis. We show that orb-weaving spiders (Araneidae and Tetragnathidae) are more abundant in high sound level environments, but do not seem to be affected by the background noise spectrum. We explore multiple hypotheses for these patterns, such as loss of vertebrate predators and increased prey capture, and then assess how web-building behavior and body condition may be altered. Here, we demonstrate that river noise has the potential to alter spider abundance and behavior.</p>
Traffic noise inhibits cognitive performance in a songbird
<p>Noise pollution is commonly associated with human environments and mounting evidence indicates that noise has a variety of negative effects on wildlife. Noise has also been linked to cognitive impairment in humans and because many animals use cognitively-intensive processes to overcome environmental challenges, noise pollution has the potential to interfere with cognitive function in animals living in urban areas or near roads. We experimentally examined how road traffic noise impacts avian cognitive performance by testing adult zebra finches (Taeniopygia guttata) on a battery of foraging tasks in the presence or absence of traffic noise playback. Here we show that traffic noise reduces cognitive performance, including inhibitory control, motor learning, spatial memory, and social learning, but not associative color learning. This study demonstrates a novel mechanism through which anthropogenic noise can impact animals, namely through cognitive interference, and suggests that noise pollution may have previously unconsidered consequences for animals.</p>
Data for: Little parental response to anthropogenic noise in an urban songbird, but evidence for individual differences in sensitivity
<p><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span>Anthropogenic<b> </b>noise exposure has well-documented behavioral, physiological and fitness effects on organisms. However, whether different noise regimes evoke distinct responses has rarely been investigated, despite implications for tailoring noise mitigation policies. Urban animals might display low responsiveness to certain anthropogenic noise regimes, especially consistent noise (e.g. freeway noise), but might remain more sensitive to more diverse noise regimes. Additionally, whether individuals differ in noise sensitivity is a rarely explored issue, which is important to fully understand organismal responses to noise. To address these knowledge gaps, we used a field experiment to measure how urban great tits (<i>Parus major</i>) altered parental behaviors in response to two noise regimes: consistent freeway noise, and a diverse anthropogenic noise regime that incorporated variability in noise type and temporal occurrence. We also evaluated whether sex, age, or a well-described personality trait, novel environment exploration behavior, were associated with responses to noise, although our power to assess individual differences in responses was somewhat limited. We found no evidence for mean population-level changes in nestling provisioning behaviors during either noise treatment. However, despite this overall canalization of behavior, there was evidence for individual differences in noise sensitivity, particularly during the diverse noise treatment. Females and birds that explored a novel environment more rapidly (fast explorers) reduced nestling provisioning rate more relative to baseline levels than males and slow explorers during the diverse urban noise, but not during the consistent freeway noise. Furthermore, first year breeders and fast explorers displayed larger increases in latency to return to the nest box relative to baseline conditions during the diverse noise only. Results suggest that urban animal populations might become overall tolerant to anthropogenic noise, but that certain individuals within these populations nonetheless remain sensitive to certain types of noise exposure.</span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></p>
Noise distracts foraging bats
<p>Predators frequently must detect and localize their prey in challenging environments. Noisy environments have been prevalent across the evolutionary history of predator-prey relationships, but now with increasing anthropogenic activities noise is becoming a more prominent feature of many landscapes. Here, we use the gleaning pallid bat, <i>Antrozous pallidus, </i>to investigate the mechanism by which noise disrupts hunting behavior. Noise can primarily function to <i>mask </i>– obscure by spectrally overlapping a cue of interest, or <i>distract </i>– occupy an animal's attentional or other cognitive resources. Using band-limited white noise treatments that either overlapped the frequencies of a prey cue or did not overlap this cue, we find evidence that distraction is a primary driver of reduced hunting efficacy in an acoustically-mediated predator. Under exposure to both noise types successful prey localization declined by half, search time nearly tripled, and bats used 25% more sonar pulses than when hunting in ambient conditions. Overall, the pallid bat does not seem capable of compensating for environmental noise. These findings have implications for mitigation strategies, specifically the importance of reducing sources of noise on the landscape rather than attempting to reduce the bandwidth of anthropogenic noise.</p>
Data from: Higher songs of city birds may not be an individual response to noise
It has been observed in many songbird species that populations in noisy urban areas sing with a higher minimum frequency than do matched populations in quieter, less developed areas. However, why and how this divergence occurs is not yet understood. We experimentally tested whether chronic noise exposure during vocal learning results in songs with higher minimum frequencies in great tits (Parus major), the first species for which a correlation between anthropogenic noise and song frequency was observed. We also tested vocal plasticity of adult great tits in response to changing background noise levels by measuring song frequency and amplitude as we changed noise conditions. We show that noise exposure during ontogeny did not result in songs with higher minimum frequencies. In addition, we found that adult birds did not make any frequency or song usage adjustments when their background noise conditions were changed after song crystallization. These results challenge the common view of vocal adjustments by city birds, as they suggest that either noise itself is not the causal force driving the divergence of song frequency between urban and forest populations, or that noise induces population-wide changes over a time scale of several generations rather than causing changes in individual behaviour.
Data from: Experimental traffic noise attracts birds during the breeding season
Understanding how anthropogenic disturbance affects animal behavior is challenging because observational studies often involve co-occurring disturbances (e.g., noise, lighting, and roadways), and laboratory experiments often lack ecological validity. During the 2016 and 2017 avian breeding seasons, we investigated the effects of anthropogenic noise and light on the singing and spatial behavior of wild birds by independently manipulating the presence of each type of disturbance at 89 sites in an otherwise undisturbed boreal forest in Labrador, Canada. Each treatment was surrounded by an 8-channel microphone array that recorded and localized avian vocalizations throughout the manipulation. We analyzed the effects of noise and light on the timing of the first vocalizations of each species at each array during the dawn chorus, and on the proximity of the vocalizing birds to the disturbance when those songs were produced. We analyzed all species combined, and then conducted separate analyses for the six most common species: Boreal Chickadee, Dark-eyed Junco, Ruby-crowned Kinglet, Swainson's Thrush, White-throated Sparrow, and Yellow-rumped Warbler. When all species were analyzed together, we found that traffic noise attracted vocalizing birds. There was some evidence that light repelled birds, but this evidence was inconsistent. In our species-specific analyses, Yellow-rumped Warbler sang earlier in response to noise; Swainson's Thrush was attracted to noise and the combination of noise and light, but repelled by light alone. Our study provides some of the first experimental evidence of the independent and combined effects of traffic noise and light on the vocal and spatial behavior of wild birds, and suggests that breeding birds may be attracted to noisy roads where they could be exposed to additional forms of disturbance.
Data from: Why does noise reduce response to alarm calls? Experimental assessment of masking, distraction and greater vigilance in wild birds
1. Environmental noise from anthropogenic and other sources affects many aspects of animal ecology and behaviour, including acoustic communication. Acoustic masking is often assumed in field studies to be the cause of compromised communication in noise, but other mechanisms could have similar effects. 2. We tested experimentally how background noise disrupted the response to conspecific alarm calls in wild superb fairy-wrens, Malurus cyaneus, assessing the effects of acoustic masking, distraction and changes in vigilance. We first examined the birds' response to alarm-call playbacks accompanied by different amplitudes of background noise that overlapped the calls in acoustic frequency. We then scored and videoed their response to alarm calls in two types of background noise, that did or did not overlap call frequency, but were broadcast at a constant amplitude. 3. Birds were less likely to flee to alarm calls in higher amplitudes of overlapping noise, demonstrating that noise itself compromised communication independently of environmental correlates. Background noise affected the response only if it overlapped in frequency with the alarm calls, implying that the effect was not due to distraction. Further, birds were equally vigilant during background noise of overlapping or non-overlapping frequency, indicating that the lack of response to alarm calls in overlapping noise was not due to enhanced vigilance and awareness that there was no predator. 4. We conclude that alarm-call reception was compromised by masking, a mechanism that is often assumed but rarely tested in an ecological context. Masking compromised reception of high-frequency 'aerial' alarm calls and so could reduce survival in background noise of similar frequency. While anthropogenic noise, which is often of lower frequency, is unlikely to affect communication with these calls, it could affect reception of acoustic cues of danger, or other conspecific or heterospecific alarm calls.
Data from: Composite measures of selection can improve the signal-to-noise ratio in genome scans
The growing wealth of genomic data is yielding new insights into the genetic basis of adaptation, but it also presents the challenge of extracting the relevant signal from multi-dimensional datasets. Different statistical approaches vary in their power to detect selection depending on the demographic history, type of selection, genetic architecture and experimental design. Here, we develop and evaluate new approaches for combining results from multiple tests, including multivariate distance measures and methods for combining P-values. We evaluate these methods on (i) simulated landscape genetic data analysed for differentiation outliers and genetic-environment associations and (ii) empirical genomic data analysed for selective sweeps within dog breeds for loci known to be selected for during domestication. We also introduce and evaluate how robust statistical algorithms can be used for parameter estimation in statistical genomics. On the simulated data, many of the composite measures performed well and had decreased variation in outcomes across many sampling designs. On the empirical dataset, methods based on combining P-values generally performed better with clearer signals of selection, higher significance of the signal, and in closer proximity to the known selected locus. Although robust algorithms could identify neutral loci in our simulations, they did not universally improve power to detect selection. Overall, a composite statistic that measured a robust multivariate distance from rank-based P-values performed the best. We found that composite measures of selection could improve the signal of selection in many cases, but they were not a panacea and their power is limited by the power of the univariate statistics they summarize. Since genome scans are widely used, improving inference for prioritizing candidate genes may be beneficial to medicine, agriculture, and breeding. Our results also have application to outlier detection in high-dimensional datasets and to combining results in meta-analyses in many disciplines. The compound measures we evaluate are implemented in the r package minotaur.
Data from: Vocal characteristics of prairie dog alarm calls across an urban noise gradient
<p>Increasing anthropogenic noise is having a global impact on wildlife, particularly due to the masking of crucial acoustical communication. However, there have been few studies examining the impacts of noise exposure on communication in free-ranging terrestrial mammals. We studied alarm calls of black-tailed prairie dogs (<i>Cynomys ludovicianus</i>) across an urban gradient to explore vocal adjustment relative to different levels of noise exposure. There was no change in the frequency 5%, peak frequency or duration of the alarm calls across the noise gradient. However, the minimum frequency – a commonly used, yet potentially compromised metric – did indeed show a positive relationship with noise exposure. We suspect this is a result of masking of observable call properties by noise, rather than behavioural adjustment. In addition, the proximity of conspecifics and the distance to<span> </span><span><span>the perceived threat (observer)</span></span><span> did </span>affect the frequency 5% of alarm calls. These results reveal that prairie dogs do not appear to be adjusting their alarm calls in noisy environments but likely do in relation to their social context and the proximity of a predatory threat. Anthropogenic noise can elicit a range of behavioural and physiological responses across taxa, but elucidating the specific mechanisms driving these responses can be challenging, particularly as these are not necessarily mutually exclusive. Our research sheds light on how prairie dogs appear to respond to noise as a source of increased risk, rather than as a distraction or through acoustical masking as shown in other commonly studied species (e.g. fish, songbirds, marine mammals).</p>
Data from: Fine-scale movement responses of free-ranging harbour porpoises to capture, tagging, and short-term noise pulses from a single airgun
Knowledge about the impact of anthropogenic disturbances on the behavioural responses of cetaceans is constrained by lack of data on fine-scale movements of individuals. We equipped five free-ranging harbour porpoises (Phocoena phocoena) with high-resolution location and dive loggers and exposed them to a single 10 in3 underwater airgun producing high-intensity noise pulses (2−3 second intervals) for one minute. All five porpoises responded to capture and tagging with longer, faster and more directed movements as well as with shorter, shallower, less wiggly dives immediately after release, with natural behaviour resumed in ≤24 hours. When we exposed porpoises to airgun pulses at ranges of 420−690 m with noise level estimates of 135−147 dB re 1µPa2s (SEL), one individual displayed rapid and directed movements away from the exposure site and two individuals used shorter and shallower dives compared to natural behaviour immediately after exposure. Noise-induced movement typically lasted for ≤8 hours with an additional 24-hour recovery period until natural behaviour was resumed. The remaining individuals did not show any quantifiable responses to the noise exposure. Changes in natural behaviour following anthropogenic disturbances may reduce feeding opportunities and evaluating potential population-level consequences should be a priority research area.
Data from: Harbour seals avoid tidal turbine noise: implications for collision risk
1. Tidal stream energy converters (turbines) are currently being installed in tidally energetic coastal sites. However, there is currently a high level of uncertainty surrounding the potential environmental impacts on marine mammals. This is a key consenting risk to commercial introduction of tidal energy technology. Concerns derive primarily from the potential for injury to marine mammals through collisions with moving components of turbines. To understand the nature of this risk, information on how animals respond to tidal turbines is urgently required. 2. We measured the behaviour of harbour seals in response to acoustic playbacks of simulated tidal turbine sound within a narrow coastal channel subject to strong, tidally induced currents. This was carried out using data from animal-borne GPS tags and shore-based observations, which were analysed to quantify behavioural responses to the turbine sound. 3. Results showed that the playback state (silent control or turbine signal) was not a significant predictor of the overall number of seals sighted within the channel. 4. However, there was a localised impact of the turbine signal; tagged harbour seals exhibited significant spatial avoidance of the sound which resulted in a reduction in the usage by seals of between 11 and 41% at the playback location. The significant decline in usage extended to 500 m from the playback location at which usage decreased by between 1 and 9% during playback. 5. Synthesis and applications: This study provides important information for policy makers looking to assess the potential impacts of tidal turbines and advise on development of the tidal energy industry. Results showing that seals avoid tidal turbine sound suggest that a proportion of seals encountering tidal turbines will exhibit behavioural responses resulting in avoidance of physical injury; in practice, the empirical changes in usage can be used directly as avoidance rates when using collision risk models to predict the effects of tidal turbines on seals. There is now a clear need to measure how marine mammals behave in response to actual operating tidal turbines in the long term to learn whether marine mammals and tidal turbines can co-exist safely at the scales currently envisaged for the industry.
Data from: Fish in habitats with higher motorboat disturbance show reduced sensitivity to motorboat noise
Anthropogenic noise can negatively impact many taxa worldwide. It is possible that in noisy, high-disturbance environments the range and severity of impacts could diminish over time, but the influence of previous disturbance remains untested in natural conditions. This study demonstrates effects of motorboat noise on the physiology of an endemic cichlid fish in Lake Malaŵi. Exposure to motorboats driven 20–100 m from fish and loudspeaker-playback of motorboat noise both elevated oxygen-consumption rate at a single lower-disturbance site, characterised by low historic and current motorboat activity. Repeating this assay at further lower-disturbance sites revealed a consistent effect of elevated oxygen consumption in response to motorboat disturbance. However, when similar trials were repeated at four higher-disturbance sites, no effect of motorboat exposure was detected. These results demonstrate that disturbance history can affect local population responses to noise. Action regarding noise pollution should consider the past, as well as the present, when planning for the future.
Direct and indirect effects of noise pollution alter biological communities in and near noise-exposed environments
<p>Noise pollution is pervasive across every ecosystem on Earth. Although decades of research have documented a variety of negative impacts of noise to organisms, key gaps remain, such as how noise affects different taxa within a biological community and how effects of noise propagate across space. We experimentally applied traffic noise pollution to multiple roadless areas and quantified the impacts of noise on birds, grasshoppers, and odonates. We show that acoustically-oriented birds have reduced species richness and abundance and different community compositions in experimentally noise-exposed areas relative to comparable quiet locations. We also found both acoustically-oriented grasshoppers and odonates without acoustic receptors to have reduced species richness and/or abundance in relatively quiet areas that abut noise-exposed areas. These results suggest that noise pollution not only affects acoustically-oriented animals, but that noise may reverberate through biological communities through indirect effects to those with no clear links to the acoustic realm, even in adjacent quiet environments.</p>
Data from: Predicting the effect of urban noise on the active space of avian vocal signals
Urbanization changes the physical environment of non-human species, but also markedly changes their acoustic environment. Urban noise interferes with acoustic communication in a range of animals including birds, with potentially profound impacts on fitness. However, a mechanistic theory to predict which species of birds will be most affected by urban noise is lacking. We develop a mathematical model to predict the decrease in the active space of avian vocal signals when moving from quiet forest habitats to noisy urban habitats, and find that the magnitude of the decrease is largely a function of signal frequency. However, this relationship is not monotonic. A meta-regression of observed increases in the frequency of birdsong in urban noise supports the model's predictions for signals with frequencies between 1.5 and 4 kHz. Using the results of the meta-regression and the model described above, we show that the expected gain in active space following observed frequency shifts is up to 12%, and greatest for birds with signals at the lower end of this frequency range. Our generally-applicable model, along with three predictions regarding the behavioral and population-level responses of birds to urban noise, represents an important step towards a theory of acoustic communication in urban habitats.
Data from: Effects of ambient noise on detectability and localization of avian songs and tones by observers in grasslands
Probability of detection and accuracy of distance estimates in aural avian surveys may be affected by the presence of anthropogenic noise, and this may lead to inaccurate evaluations of the effects of noisy infrastructure on wildlife. We used arrays of speakers broadcasting recordings of grassland bird songs and pure tones to assess the probability of detection, and localization accuracy, by observers at sites with and without noisy oil and gas infrastructure in south-central Alberta from 2012 to 2014. Probability of detection varied with species and with speaker distance from transect line, but there were few effects of noisy infrastructure. Accuracy of distance estimates for songs and tones decreased as distance to observer increased, and distance estimation error was higher for tones at sites with infrastructure noise. Our results suggest that quiet to moderately loud anthropogenic noise may not mask detection of bird songs; however, errors in distance estimates during aural surveys may lead to inaccurate estimates of avian densities calculated using distance sampling. We recommend caution when applying distance sampling if most birds are unseen, and where ambient noise varies among treatments.
Data from: Long-term sound and movement recording tags to study natural behaviour and reaction to ship noise of seals
The impact of anthropogenic noise on marine fauna is of increasing conservation concern with vessel noise being one of the major contributors. Animals that rely on shallow coastal habitats may be especially vulnerable to this form of pollution. Very limited information is available on how much noise from ship traffic individual animals experience, and how they may react to it due to a lack of suitable methods. To address this, we developed long‐duration audio and 3D‐movement tags (DTAGs) and deployed them on three harbor seals and two gray seals in the North Sea during 2015–2016. These tags recorded sound, accelerometry, magnetometry, and pressure continuously for up to 21 days. GPS positions were also sampled for one seal continuously throughout the recording period. A separate tag, combining a camera and an accelerometer logger, was deployed on two harbor seals to visualize specific behaviors that helped interpret accelerometer signals in the DTAG data. Combining data from depth, accelerometer, and audio sensors, we found that animals spent 6.6%–42.3% of the time hauled out (either on land or partly submerged), and 5.3%–12.4% of their at‐sea time resting at the sea bottom, while the remaining time was used for traveling, resting at surface, and foraging. Animals were exposed to audible vessel noise 2.2%–20.5% of their time when in water, and we demonstrate that interruption of functional behaviors (e.g., resting) in some cases coincides with high‐level vessel noise. Two‐thirds of the ship noise events were traceable by the AIS vessel tracking system, while one‐third comprised vessels without AIS. This preliminary study demonstrates how concomitant long‐term continuous broadband on‐animal sound and movement recordings may be an important tool in future quantification of disturbance effects of anthropogenic activities at sea and assessment of long‐term population impacts on pinnipeds.
Data from: Variation in harbour porpoise activity in response to seismic survey noise
Animals exposed to anthropogenic disturbance make trade-offs between perceived risk and the cost of leaving disturbed areas. Impact assessments tend to focus on overt behavioural responses leading to displacement, but trade-offs may also impact individual energy budgets through reduced foraging performance. Previous studies found no evidence for broad-scale displacement of harbour porpoises exposed to impulse noise from a 10 day two-dimensional seismic survey. Here, we used an array of passive acoustic loggers coupled with calibrated noise measurements to test whether the seismic survey influenced the activity patterns of porpoises remaining in the area. We showed that the probability of recording a buzz declined by 15% in the ensonified area and was positively related to distance from the source vessel. We also estimated received levels at the hydrophones and characterized the noise response curve. Our results demonstrate how environmental impact assessments can be developed to assess more subtle effects of noise disturbance on activity patterns and foraging efficiency.
Data from: Responses of bottlenose dolphins and harbor porpoises to impact and vibration piling noise during harbor construction
The development of risk assessments for the exposure of protected populations to noise from coastal construction is constrained by uncertainty over the nature and extent of marine mammal responses to man-made noise. Stakeholder concern often focuses on the potential for local displacement caused by impact piling, where piles are hammered into the seabed. To mitigate this threat, use of vibration piling, where piles are shaken into place with a vibratory hammer, is often encouraged due to presumed impact reduction. However, data on comparative responses of cetaceans to these different noise sources are lacking. We studied the responses of bottlenose dolphins and harbor porpoises to both impact and vibration pile driving noise during harbor construction works in northeast Scotland, using passive acoustic monitoring devices to record cetacean activity and noise recorders to measure and predict received noise levels. Local abundance and patterns of occurrence of bottlenose dolphins were also compared with a five-year baseline. The median peak-to-peak source level estimated for impact piling was 240 dB re 1 μPa (single-pulse sound exposure level [SEL] 198 dB re 1 μPa2 s), and the r.m.s. source level for vibration piling was 192 dB re 1 μPa. Predicted received broadband SEL values 812 m from the piling site were markedly lower due to high propagation loss: 133.4 dB re 1 μPa2 s (impact) and 128.9 dB re 1 μPa2 s (vibration). Bottlenose dolphins and harbor porpoises were not excluded from sites in the vicinity of impact piling or vibration piling; nevertheless, some small effects were detected. Bottlenose dolphins spent a reduced period of time in the vicinity of construction works during both impact and vibration piling. The probability of occurrence of both cetacean species was also slightly less during periods of vibration piling. This work provides developers and managers with the first evidence of the comparative effects of vibration and impact piling on small cetaceans, enabling more informed risk assessments, policy frameworks, and mitigation plans. In particular, our results emphasize the need for better understanding of noise levels and behavioral responses to vibration piling before recommending its use to mitigate impact piling.
Intrapopulation Variation in the Behavioural Responses of Dwarf Mongooses to Anthropogenic Noise
<p>Anthropogenic noise is an increasingly widespread pollutant, with a rapidly burgeoning literature demonstrating impacts on humans and other animals. However, most studies have simply considered if there is an effect of noise, examining the overall cohort response. Whilst substantial evidence exists for intraspecific variation in responses to other anthropogenic disturbances, this possibility has received relatively little experimental attention with respect to noise. Here, we used field-based playbacks with dwarf mongooses (<i>Helogale parvula</i>) to test how traffic noise affects vigilance behaviour, and to examine potential variation between individuals of different age class, sex and dominance status. Foragers exhibited a stronger immediate reaction and increased their subsequent vigilance (both that on the ground and as a sentinel) in response to traffic-noise playback compared to ambient-sound playback. Traffic-noise playback also resulted in sentinels conducting longer bouts and being more likely to change post height or location than in ambient-sound playback. Moreover, there was evidence of variation in noise responses with respect to age class and dominance status, but not sex. In traffic noise, foraging pups were more likely to flee and were slower to resume foraging than adults; they also tended to increase their vigilance more than adults. Dominants were more likely than subordinates to move post during sentinel bouts conducted in traffic-noise trials. Our findings suggest that the vigilance–foraging trade-off is affected by traffic noise, but that individuals differ in how they respond. Future work should therefore consider intrapopulation response variation to understand fully the population-wide effects of this global pollutant.</p>
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These curated guides explain access requirements, typical timelines, costs, and reuse considerations for widely used research datasets.
Allen Brain Atlas
Allen Brain Atlas is an Allen Institute collection of brain map atlases, datasets, APIs, and analysis tools covering mouse, human, and non-human primate brain resources.
Annotated Behaviour and Observability Dataset (ABODe)
ABODe is a University of Edinburgh DataShare dataset for behavior classification in group-housed mice using home-cage video, identities, bounding boxes, ground-plate positions, and annotator labels.
DANDI Archive for NWB datasets
DANDI is a BRAIN Initiative archive for publishing and sharing neurophysiology data, including electrophysiology, optophysiology, and behavioral data packaged as NWB and related standards.
International Brain Laboratory public data
The International Brain Laboratory public data releases expose standardized mouse decision-making experiments, including Neuropixels recordings, widefield calcium imaging, behavior, and session metadata accessed through the ONE API.
OpenNeuro
OpenNeuro is a free, open platform for sharing neuroimaging datasets, with public search, dataset pages, and download paths for web, S3, DataLad, and the OpenNeuro CLI.