Many animals - including seals, dolphins and bats -are able to communicate vocally. But parrots are one of the few birds considered 'vocal learners', meaning they can imitate members of another species including human speech. For long, scientists have been trying to figure out why some bird species are better imitators than others, but could not find any differences except in the sizes of particular brain regions. A recent study by an international team of researchers led by Mukta Chakraborty of Duke University, Durham, USA, has brought to light key structural differences in parrot brains that may help explain the birds' unparalleled ability to imitate sounds and human speech. The study has been able to pinpoint the region in the brain that may be allowing this to happen - the region that is also involved in controlling movement. The finding could perhaps also explain the fact that parrots, just like humans, can talk and dance (Plos One, June 24, 2015. DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0118496). The team included researchers from Denmark and the Netherlands who donated precious bird brain tissue for the study.
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