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Skull morphological adaptations to acoustic emissions: peak frequency in bats

Giacomini, Giada1; Tamagnini, Davide2; Chaverri, Gloriana3; Herrel, Anthony4; Brown, Richard1; Portela-Miguez, Roberto5; Meloro, Carlo11

Published Apr 27, 2026 on Dryad. https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.c59zw3rnt

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Abstract

Chiropteran species developed different sound emission systems (i.e. oral or nasal) implying divergent skull morphological adaptations. Species combining multiple sensory strategies to locate their food might present a weaker selection pressure on their skulls due to echolocation compared to species that use echolocation as main sensory system. Consequently, we predicted that skull shape of non-insectivorous bats should not present associations between skull morphology and peak frequency. We tested for the relationship between skull morphology (size and shape, derived from 3D geometric morphometrics) and peak frequency (FP) in a macroevolutionary dataset including ~65% of extant bat genera. Phylogenetic comparative methods were employed to assess skull morphological variation associated to FP. Unexpectedly, we found that also frugivorous nasal emitters presented significant skull shape (but not size) adaptations to the frequency emitted. In both insectivorous and frugivorous species, high frequencies were associated with a relatively short rostrum. Our study indicates that FP constrains skull shape variation of nasal emitters more strongly compared to mouth emitters. These results suggest that echolocation parameters play an important role in bat skull evolution.