Research Description
Our lab seeks to understand how animals sense their surroundings, use this information to make decisions in natural environments, and translate those decisions into actions at both the individual and collective levels. Using bats as a model system, we investigate these processes across key behaviors, including navigation, foraging, and roosting, through the lens of behavioral and sensory ecology. Using long-term, multimodal monitoring of wild bat populations, we examine how decision-making emerges and shifts across ecological contexts, social environments, and life-history stages. Ultimately, we aim to uncover how these processes shape individual and collective behavior, fitness, and the capacity of populations and species to respond to environmental change.
Research Keywords: Bats, Behavioral ecology, Sensory ecology, Decision-making
Representative Publications
Goldshtein, A.†*, Mazar, O.†, Harten, L., Amichai, E., Assa, R., Levi, A., Orchan, Y., Toledo, S., Nathan, R., Yovel, Y. 2025. On-board recordings reveal how bats maneuver with severe acoustic interference. PNAS 122(14):e2407810122. (DOI: 10.1073/pnas.2407810122).
Goldshtein, A., Yovel, Y. 2024. On-board sensors reveal new insights into animal decision-making. Annual Review of Ecology, Evolution, and Systematics 55:115–131.(DOI: 10.1146/annurev-ecolsys-102722-125640)
Goldshtein, A.†*, Chen, X.†, Amichai, E., Boonman, A., Harten, L., Yinon, O., Orchan, Y., Nathan, R., Toledo, S., Couzin, I.D., Yovel, Y. 2024. Acoustic cognitive map-based navigation in echolocating bats. Science 386(6721), 561–567. (DOI: 10.1126/science.adn6269)
Goldshtein, A., Akrish, S., Giryes, R., Yovel, Y. 2022. An artificial neural network explains how bats might use vision for navigation. Communications Biology 5:1–8. (DOI: 10.1016/j.cub.2021.11.010)
Goldshtein, A.†, Harten, L.†, Yovel, Y. 2022. Mother bats facilitate pup navigation learning. Current Biology 32:350–360.e4.(DOI: 10.1016/j.cub.2021.11.010)
