Bat mothers' hearts beat faster when they hear their pups

A study published today in Frontiers in Ethology found that mother Japanese house bats' heart rates speed up when they hear the isolation cries of their own pups, even recognizing their adult offspring's echolocation calls months later. Researchers at Doshisha University monitored mothers' heart rates using ECG machines while playing recordings of pup calls and found mothers responded only to their own offspring's vocalizations.