Female baboons exhibit vaginal responses after mating that may affect sperm survival, with the strongest responses toward genetically similar males

Female sperm discrimination that can bias fertilization outcomes has been observed in animals, but in vivo evidence is lacking in large mammals. This study shows that the female olive baboon vaginal tract can exert post-copulatory mate selection by altering sperm survival via vaginal immune responses and pH according to male genetic makeup, with the strongest responses to genetically similar males.

In your coverage, please use this URL to provide access to the freely available paper in PLOS Biology: https://plos.io/4r6BjBy

Article title: Evidence for genetically-based sperm discrimination in the vaginal tract of a primate species

Author countries: United States of America, Canada, Germany

Funding: This study was funded by: National Science Foundation Doctoral Dissertation Research Improvement Grant (grant no. 1826804) to RMP and JPH, Wenner-Gren Foundation Dissertation Fieldwork Grant (grant #9921) to RMP, Leakey Foundation Research Grant to RMP, Animal Behavior Society Student Research Grant to RMP, Primate Society of Great Britian Primate Research Grant to RMP, International Primatological Society Research Grant to RMP, American Society of Mammologists Grant-in-Aid to RMP, Society for Integrative and Comparative Biology Research Grant to RMP, Sigma Xi Grant-in-Aid of Research to RMP, New York University Intramural Funds to JPH, and the Canada Research Chairs program (grant no. 950-231257) to ADM. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.