A bat immune marker changed with sex, age and season instead of tracking one simple physiological state
WHAT THE EVIDENCE SAYS
Field sampling of wild greater spear-nosed bats found urinary neopterin positively associated with cortisol, with age-related decline in males but not females and lower male levels during the mating season. The marker therefore reflected multiple biological axes rather than one simple immune state.
WHY IT MATTERS / OUR READ
Wildlife-health biomarkers become much more useful when their demographic and seasonal baselines are known. Without that context, normal sex or life-history variation can be misread as disease or stress.
CAVEATS / UNCERTAINTY
This is one species and field population, and neopterin is a biomarker rather than a direct measure of disease outcome. Correlations with cortisol do not establish causation, and the demographic patterns should not be generalized to other bat taxa without validation.
SOURCE
Scientific Reports
View original evidence ↗
In wild greater spear-nosed bats, urinary neopterin covaried with cortisol and showed sex- and age-dependent patterns, complicating its use as a stand-alone immune indicator.
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