Fig. 6: Striped hamsters exposed to flea bites exhibited reduced exploratory behavior in both indoor infection and outdoor enclosure experiments.
From: Ectoparasites enhance survival by suppressing host exploration and limiting dispersal
a Schematic diagram of laboratory infection in striped hamsters, created in BioRender. Liu, P. (2025) https://BioRender.com/ps1cm2y. b Open field test for striped hamster, n = 5 each group, tested using a Generalized Linear Model (GLM). Thick bars indicate the interquartile range (IQR) around the median, and whiskers represent 1.5 times the interquartile range (maxima: Q3 + 1.5 × IQR, minima: Q1 − 1.5 × IQR). Each black dot represents an individual. Asterisks indicate the significance. (Pfemale = 0.03, Pmale = 0.26). c Cytokine levels in striped hamster skin presented in boxplot where red is Flea− (n = 3–7) and blue is Flea+ (n = 7–9). Two-sided t test was used. Thick bars indicate the interquartile range (IQR) around the median, and whiskers represent 1.5 times the interquartile range (maxima: Q3 + 1.5 × IQR, minima: Q1 − 1.5 × IQR). Each black dot represents an individual. Asterisks indicate the significance. d Cytokine levels in striped hamster serum presented in boxplot where red is Flea− (n = 5) and blue is Flea+ (n = 5). Two-sided t test was used. Thick bars indicate the interquartile range (IQR) around the median, and whiskers represent 1.5 times the interquartile range (maxima: Q3 + 1.5 × IQR, minima: Q1 − 1.5 × IQR). Each black dot represents an individual. Asterisks indicate the significance. e Schematic diagram of the three rounds of enclosure field experiments under natural conditions. f Bar graph of the capture rate of striped hamsters released into the enclosures. g Forest plot illustrating that Flea+ (n = 72) striped hamsters had a significantly higher escape rate than Flea− (n = 62) hamsters, tested using a generalized linear mixed model (GLMM). The x-axis represents the coefficients of various predictor variables. Solid circles indicate statistically significant results, while hollow circles represent non-significant results. Data are presented as mean values ± SEM. h Field sampling sites for striped hamsters, selected based on temperature and precipitation gradients. Created using the open-source R packages ggplot2 (MIT License). i The number of striped hamsters captured during each sampling event at each site, with no capture records for striped hamsters at site N5. Source data are provided as a Source Data file. ***p < 0.001, **p < 0.01, *p < 0.05.
