Study
How the zebra got its stripes: a problem with too many solutions
Larison, Brenda; Harrigan, Ryan J.; Thomassen, Henri A.; Rubenstein, Daniel I.; Chan-Golston, Alec M.; Li, Elizabeth; Smith, Thomas B.
Royal Society Open Science, 2015
Scored stripe number, width and definition across plains zebra populations spanning the species range, and tested the variation against environmental predictors including temperature, rainfall, vegetation, disease and predator variables.
- Studied in
- Equus quagga
- Sample size
- plains zebra populations across Africa scored for stripe variation
Within plains zebras, stripe definition on the torso correlated most strongly with temperature, with more strongly striped animals in warmer regions.
What it means
The authors' reading, and ours. Where they differ, that difference is the point.
How the authors put it
Temperature is associated with striping variation within the species, which the authors suggest is consistent with a thermoregulatory contribution.
How NatureHQ reads it
Kept because it complicates the tidy answer, which is why it earns its place. It looks at variation *within* one species where the fly analysis compared *between* species, and it finds a temperature signal. Temperature also correlates with fly abundance, so the two are hard to separate — and NatureHQ reports the disagreement rather than picking a side.
- Temperature and biting-fly abundance are themselves correlated, so this analysis cannot cleanly separate them.
- Correlational within one species, with no experimental test of a thermal mechanism.
- Direct tests of stripe-driven cooling have generally failed to find an effect large enough to matter.
What this study is used for on NatureHQ
One study can inform several subjects. Here is everywhere this one is cited.
Published by: The Royal SocietyPublished by the Royal Society.
Checked against Crossref on 2026-09-28, and they agree on the title, the authors and the year.
NatureHQ summarises research in its own words and does not reproduce published text. Reviewed 2026-09-03.