These whales still use their vocal cords. But how?
Unusual experiments on organs recovered from three carcasses suggest how baleen whales call at sea.
People have been telling stories of strange underwater noises for thousands of years, but it wasn't until the mid-20th century that scientists identified one of the causes: whales were singing, whistling, and squealing in the blue.
How some whales make these sounds has remained a mystery. A study published Wednesday in the journal Nature puts forward a new explanation, discovered thanks to a device that passed air through the voice boxes of three dead whales.
The voice box, or larynx, is an ancient organ. “This evolved when fish came out of the sea and animals needed a way to separate the air they breathed from the food they took in,” said study author Coen Elemans. and professor of biology at the University. from southern Denmark.
The larynx functions as an antechamber to the trachea, or windpipe, with a flap of tissue called the epiglottis preventing food and drink from falling into the trachea. A little below the epiglottis, mammals have evolved additional folds of tissue, called vocal folds or vocal folds, which produce sounds when air exhaled from the lungs causes them to vibrate.
When the terrestrial ancestors of whales returned to life in the sea, "they had to change the larynx, because when these animals breathe on the surface, they need to expel a lot of air very quickly,” said Dr. Elemans. Vocal cords like those of land mammals could get in the way.
A view of the larynx of a whale humped during the experiments. In the circle on the left, the fat pad is at the top, and to the right and left are the vocal cords. Air forced between the folds and the cushion can produce sound.CreditCredit...Coen P.H. Elemans, University of Southern DenmarkWe are having difficulty retrieving the contents of the article.
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Unusual experiments on organs recovered from three carcasses suggest how baleen whales call at sea.
People have been telling stories of strange underwater noises for thousands of years, but it wasn't until the mid-20th century that scientists identified one of the causes: whales were singing, whistling, and squealing in the blue.
How some whales make these sounds has remained a mystery. A study published Wednesday in the journal Nature puts forward a new explanation, discovered thanks to a device that passed air through the voice boxes of three dead whales.
The voice box, or larynx, is an ancient organ. “This evolved when fish came out of the sea and animals needed a way to separate the air they breathed from the food they took in,” said study author Coen Elemans. and professor of biology at the University. from southern Denmark.
The larynx functions as an antechamber to the trachea, or windpipe, with a flap of tissue called the epiglottis preventing food and drink from falling into the trachea. A little below the epiglottis, mammals have evolved additional folds of tissue, called vocal folds or vocal folds, which produce sounds when air exhaled from the lungs causes them to vibrate.
When the terrestrial ancestors of whales returned to life in the sea, "they had to change the larynx, because when these animals breathe on the surface, they need to expel a lot of air very quickly,” said Dr. Elemans. Vocal cords like those of land mammals could get in the way.
A view of the larynx of a whale humped during the experiments. In the circle on the left, the fat pad is at the top, and to the right and left are the vocal cords. Air forced between the folds and the cushion can produce sound.CreditCredit...Coen P.H. Elemans, University of Southern DenmarkWe are having difficulty retrieving the contents of the article.
Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings. .
Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode, please exit and log in to your Times account, or subscribe to the entire Times.
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