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Bats

Nature Methods volume 21, pages 1135–1137 (2024)Cite this article

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Bats, the only flying mammals, comprise almost 25% of mammalian species. They are excellent navigators, highly social, and extremely long-lived. Their sense of echolocation has been studied for many years — but many species possess also excellent vision and olfaction. In recent years, bats have emerged as new models for neurobiology of navigation, social neuroscience, aging, and immunity.

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Fig. 1: Egyptian fruit bat, Rousettus aegyptiacus.

Haim Ziv, Weizmann Institute of Science

Fig. 2: Experimental setups used for studying the neural bases of behavior in bats.

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Acknowledgements

We thank Noa David Geller and Genia Brodsky for graphics. We thank the current and former members of the lab for wonderful years of bat research and for comments on this column. Many thanks also to the bat community worldwide. Our lab’s research is supported by grants from ERC Synergy, NIH R01, NSF-BSF (CRCNS), DFG SFB, ISF and the Minerva Foundation.

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  1. Department of Brain Sciences, Weizmann Institute of Science, Rehovot, Israel

    Liora Las & Nachum Ulanovsky

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  1. Liora Las
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  2. Nachum Ulanovsky
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Correspondence to Nachum Ulanovsky.

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The authors declare no competing interests.

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Las, L., Ulanovsky, N. Bats. Nat Methods 21, 1135–1137 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41592-024-02330-6

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