Scientists are applying an area of mechanics and mathematics called “chaos theory” to describe the diving behavior of narwhals.
? Scientists have found a new hybrid off the coast of Greenland.To identify the daily and seasonal patterns of wild narwhal swimming, the team turned to "chaos theory," an area of scientific study that inspects irregularities and identifies patterns within those irregularities that would be otherwise difficult to detect without complex mathematics.
Applying the tools of this theory to the swimming-depth data from a single tagged narwhal over a period of around 80 days, the team identified new patterns of diurnal activity. Specifically, they found that the tagged individual tended to stay at the surface of the water around midday but descended deeply whenever it did decide to dive down.
In addition to these daily patterns, the analysis also revealed that the narwhal’s diving and surfacing shifted with the seasons. In fact, the narwhal avoided the increasingly frozen surface of the water when the weather cooled, resulting in more intense diving during the icy season. "Our approach is relatively simple to implement and can map and label long term data, identifying differences between the behavior of individual animals and different species, and also detecting perturbations in behavior caused by changing influences," the two study authors say, according to a press release.
Ultimately, the researchers conclude that their method could contribute to the future conservation of the narwhal, as well as other arctic animals, which struggle to adapt to shifts in sea ice and other forms of climate change.
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