Study of behaviours and emitted codas during sperm whales social interactions

• Main Authors: Adam, Olivier, Yernaux, Adrien, Sauvêtre, Marie, Ngosso, Justine, Nuel, Gregory, Haffner-Trinh, Marie, Troussier, Robin, Guillerm, Zohria-Lys, Picon, Léa, Barluet, Lucie, Kühn, Victoire, Delfour, Fabienne, Sarano, Veronique, Vitry, Hugues, Preud'Homme, Axel, Heuzey, Rene, Jung, Jean-Luc, Girardet, Justine, Glotin, Hervé, Sarano, Francois
• Other Authors: Institut Jean Le Rond d'Alembert (DALEMBERT), Sorbonne Université (SU)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS), Laboratoire de Probabilités, Statistique et Modélisation (LPSM (UMR_8001)), Sorbonne Université (SU)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS)-Université Paris Cité (UPCité), Centre de recherche en neurosciences de Lyon - Lyon Neuroscience Research Center (CRNL), Université Claude Bernard Lyon 1 (UCBL), Université de Lyon-Université de Lyon-Université Jean Monnet - Saint-Étienne (UJM)-Institut National de la Santé et de la Recherche Médicale (INSERM)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS), Laboratoire d'Ethologie Expérimentale et Comparée (LEEC), Université Sorbonne Paris Nord, Institut de Systématique, Evolution, Biodiversité (ISYEB ), Muséum national d'Histoire naturelle (MNHN)-École Pratique des Hautes Études (EPHE), Université Paris Sciences et Lettres (PSL)-Université Paris Sciences et Lettres (PSL)-Sorbonne Université (SU)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS)-Université des Antilles (UA), Laboratoire d'Informatique et des Systèmes (LIS) (Marseille, Toulon) (LIS), Aix Marseille Université (AMU)-Université de Toulon (UTLN)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS)
• Format: Conference Object
• Language: English
• Published: HAL CCSD 2020
• Subjects: whale detection; CNN; downsweep; [PHYS.MECA.ACOU]Physics [physics]/Mechanics [physics]/Acoustics [physics.class-ph]; [PHYS.MECA.VIBR]Physics [physics]/Mechanics [physics]/Vibrations [physics.class-ph]; Sperm whale
• Online Access: https://hal.science/hal-03230838; https://hal.science/hal-03230838/document; https://hal.science/hal-03230838/file/001088.pdf; https://doi.org/10.48465/fa.2020.1088

International audience Sperm whales live in the matrilineal population structure based on complex social interactions. Groups of 10-20 adult females stay together and raise their offspring. During social activities, they emit specific patterned time sequences of clicks, called codas. These codas are also the social unit acoustic signature. However, no associations were already done between these emitted sounds and behaviours. To answer this question, we used a dataset including simultaneous video and acoustic recordings during sperm whale activities close to the sea surface. In 2017 and 2018, 114 days of observations for 25h33min was done. A total of 1,810 behaviours and of 1,324 codas were extracted. We analyzed their internal structures, based of number of clicks and also the variation of inter-click intervals. Results showed firstly that the 8-clicks codas were the most frequent sequences for this social unit, and secondly that codas seems to be call and contact signals for this haptic species.