Neuroscience

image courtesy of AJ Gazman

Using animal examples is a great way to explain biology and other scientific principles to children.  Elephants seem to be especially captivating to children, perhaps due to their gigantic size or unique anatomy. 

A little series published by the University of Washington “Neuroscience for Kids” uses findings from a recent study that suggest elephants are able to distinguish between different ethnic groups in Kenya as a way to introduce neuroscience and includes some other interesting facts.

The total surface area of the African elephant cerebral cortex is 6,300 square cm. The surface area of the human cerebral cortex is 2,500 square cm

Cerebral cortex is the outer layer of the cerebral hemispheres in the brain that controls conscious experience and is responsible for perception, emotion, thought, and planning.

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Novel ways elephants communicate

  

photo courtesy of  Greg George

It is believed that elephants use low frequency signals transmitted through the ground as a means of communication.  A current theory is that elephants are able to sense the vibrations through pressure-sensitive nerve endings, Pacinian corpuscles, in their feet and —Meissner’s corpuscles that detect infrasonic vibrations - in the tip of their trunks.

 Scientists Katy Payne, Joyce Poole and their colleagues discovered that elephants emit a variety of infrasounds—calls too low in pitch to be heard by most humans. In 1989, Payne and her colleagues conducted a landmark experiment at a waterhole in Etosha demonstrating that these powerful infrasonic rumbles contain specific messages that can be heard and understood by other elephants more than 2 miles away.

This article contains information on the progression of seismic communication research in elephants and evidence supporting the idea that elephants use low frequency signals to communicate a variety of information from predator warnings to reproductive cues.

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Okay to hunt elephants?

photo coutesy of Brian Snelson  

Successful conservation efforts are resulting in new problems as the swelling number of elephants may exceed what parks can support.  The South African government recently lifted the ban on killing elephants as a last resort in controlling the population.  According to an article in the Guardian

Amid words of protest and expressions of relief environment minister Martinus van Schalkwyk announced the elephant had been a victim of its own success with numbers growing from 8,000 to nearly 20,000 in national parks and private reserves in just over a decade.

 Supporters of culling point to growing difficulties in managing elephants in the country’s biggest and most famous game reserve, Kruger National Park. It has more than 12,500 elephants, 5,000 more than is sustainable, according to park officials. Ecologists say the animals’ huge appetites and fondness for “habitat re-engineering” - reducing forests to flatland by uprooting trees and trampling plants as they feed and roam - threaten the park’s biodiversity. 

However, elephants endear a lot of support from South Africans and the rest of the world because of their perceived gentle nature and the strength of their social bonds.  Some conservation groups, and animal rights advocates oppose lifting the restriction and approaching the situation as a numbers game.

Michele Pickover of Animal Rights Africa, which has threatened to urge a tourist boycott if culling goes ahead, said there was no scientific proof that the killing of elephants was necessary or even effective in controlling the population.

“This is a sad day for the country. Elephants are being treated as commodities by the government and game managers,” she said.

This article from National Geographic in 2004 gives more background on the debate, which has been going on for years and has included the voices of many different groups:  parks managers, game rangers, academics, community leaders, and the representatives of animal rights groups.  

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