Study
The costs of autotomy and regeneration in animals: a review and framework for future research
Maginnis, Tara L.
Behavioral Ecology, 2006
Reviews autotomy across animal groups — lizards, crustaceans, spiders, insects, echinoderms — and organises the documented costs into immediate, regenerative and long-term categories.
- Studied in
- Animalia
- Sample size
- review across vertebrate and invertebrate autotomy
Autotomy costs recur across very distant groups: impaired locomotion or feeding, energetic expense of regeneration, reduced growth and reproduction, and altered social or competitive standing. Regeneration is frequently incomplete and rarely restores original function.
What it means
The authors' reading, and ours. Where they differ, that difference is the point.
How the authors put it
Self-amputation should be analysed as a costly escape with lasting consequences rather than as a clean solution.
How NatureHQ reads it
The record that generalises the lizard case. Losing a claw, a leg, a tail or an arm follows the same pattern wherever it occurs: immediate escape bought with a bill that arrives over the following weeks and months.
- A review across groups whose autotomy mechanisms differ substantially, so the shared cost structure is a generalisation.
- Long-term fitness consequences are measured in few species.
What this study is used for on NatureHQ
One study can inform several subjects. Here is everywhere this one is cited.
Published by: University press journalsPublished in a university press journal.
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.