Sexually selected infanticide is an important source of infant mortality in many mammalian species. In species with long-term male-female associations, females may benefit from male protection against infanticidal outsiders. We tested whether mountain gorilla (Gorilla beringei beringei) mothers in single and multi-male groups monitored by the Dian Fossey Gorilla Fund's Karisoke Research Center ...

BACKGROUND The presence of neonatal line indicates live birth and it is possible to estimate the exact period of survival of the infant in days by measuring the amount of postnatal hard tissue formation, and thus can be an evidence to the brutal act of infanticide. MATERIALS AND METHODS Primary tooth germs of both the arches were removed from the sockets of an infant who died few days after b...

Over a decade has passed since Roe v. Wade, yet the abortion controversy has not subsided. In many respects, it has intensified. The moral issue is as unresolved as ever, while the political lines are even more sharply drawn. The controversy has so many ramifications-medical, legal, social, political, and philosophical-that it is difficult to get it clearly in view. We should not be surprised t...

In order to explain the variation in primate social systems, socio-ecology has focussed on the role of ecological factors to explain female associations and relationships and on the spatio-temporal distribution of mating opportunities to explain male associations and relationships. While this approach has been quite successful, it ignores male-female associations and relationships and ignores t...

This article analyzes the practice of infanticide in indigenous communities in Brazil. Taking as a reference point a specific case involving two children of the Zuruahá people, it takes a broader look at the issue and discusses how infanticide is understood among other indigenous peoples. A debate focusing specifically on this topic that took place during a public hearing held in the Brazilian ...

In post-colonial India the female foeticide, a practice evolved from customary female infanticide of pre-colonial and colonial period, committed though in separate incidents, has made it almost a unified wave of mass murder. It does not fulfil the widely accepted existing definition of genocide but the high rate of abortion of legitimate girl-foetus by Indian parents makes their crime a kind of...