Image credit: Berta Roura-Torres (CC BY 4.0). Cropped and resized.
Caring for an infant while pregnant is associated with a higher risk of pregnancy loss in mandrills, according to a new study published in PLOS Biology. Researchers studied 356 pregnancies across 117 female mandrills over 11 years and determined that 73% of the 52 total fetal losses were among mothers with an infant under 12 months of age.
Researchers across Germany, Finland, and France explored the trade-offs between the energy costs of pregnancy and raising young offspring in mandrills through the Mandrillus Project. Pregnancy is a taxing physiological event for humans and non-human mammals alike, and this primate study's results may inform us about the reproductive costs associated with a shortened interval between birth and subsequent pregnancy in humans.
Analyzing 11 years of observational data about mandrill reproductive behavior, the study authors created models to identify associations between fetal loss and various factors related to maternal care for a young infant during pregnancy. They found that pregnant females with an infant experienced a greater risk of fetal loss than those without an infant, which ...