Peripheral androgen action helps modulate vocal production in a suboscine passerine

Matthew J Fuxjager; Jonathan B Heston; Barney A Schlinger

doi:10.1642/AUK-13-252.1

Peripheral androgen action helps modulate vocal production in a suboscine passerine

Auk. 2014 Jul;131(3):327-334. doi: 10.1642/AUK-13-252.1.

Authors

Matthew J Fuxjager¹, Jonathan B Heston², Barney A Schlinger³

Affiliations

¹ Department of Integrative Biology and Physiology, University of California, Los Angeles, California, USA ; Laboratory of Neuroendocrinology, Brain Research Institute, University of California, Los Angeles, California, USA.
² Department of Integrative Biology and Physiology, University of California, Los Angeles, California, USA ; Interdepartmental Program in Neuroscience, University of California, Los Angeles, California, USA.
³ Department of Integrative Biology and Physiology, University of California, Los Angeles, California, USA ; Laboratory of Neuroendocrinology, Brain Research Institute, University of California, Los Angeles, California, USA ; Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, University of California, Los Angeles, California, USA.

Abstract

Androgenic activation of intracellular androgen receptors (AR) influences avian vocal production, though this has largely been investigated at the level of the brain. We investigated the influence of predominantly peripheral AR on vocal output in wild Golden-collared Manakins (Manacus vitellinus). In this suboscine species, males court females by performing acrobatic displays and by producing relatively simple chee-poo vocalizations. To assess whether peripheral AR influences the acoustic structure of these vocal signals, we treated reproductively active adult males with the peripherally selective antiandrogen bicalutamide and then measured phonation performance. Inhibiting AR outside of the central nervous system increased the duration of the chee note and decreased the fundamental frequency of the poo note. This treatment caused no discernable change to chee-poo frequency modulation or entropy. Our results show that activation of peripheral AR mediates note-specific changes to temporal and pitch characteristics of the Golden-collared Manakin's main sexual call. Thus, our study provides one of the first demonstrations that androgenic action originating outside of the brain and likely on musculoskeletal targets can modulate avian vocal production.

Keywords: Golden-collared Manakin; androgen receptors; birdsong; musculoskeletal system; peripheral nervous system; skeletal muscle; social behavior; song control system; syrinx; testosterone.

Abstract

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