title: Male odors that influence the preference of female mice: roles of urinary and preputial factors.
abstract: Female mice preferred to investigate the odor of normal male urine to that of either castrated or preputialectomized male urine. Females showed no particular preferences in two-choice tests among castrated, castrated-preputialectomized and preputialectomized male urine. These results suggest that both urinary and preputial factors of males are involved in female attraction. In an experiment with urine mixtures, females preferred a mixture of urine from preputialectomized males and castrated males to a mixture of urine from preputialectomized males and castrated-preputialectomized males. This strongly suggests that the urinary factor is androgen-dependent, while the preputial factor is possibly androgen-independent. Further experiments demonstrated the possibility that the preputial odorous factor involved in female attraction is increased or newly formed after excretion of the secretion.
authors.affiliation: Department of Biology, College of Arts and Sciences, University of Tokyo, Japan.
authors.forename: K
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Ninomiya
authors.forename: T
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Kimura
mesh_terms: D000367:Age Factors; D000818:Animals; D005260:Female; D008297:Male; D051379:Mice; D009812:Odorants; D009919:Orchiectomy; D010413:Penis / Q000378:metabolism* / Q000601:surgery; D010675:Pheromones / Q000652:urine*; D012724:Sex Attractants / Q000378:metabolism / Q000502:physiology / Q000652:urine*; D012726:Sexual Behavior, Animal / Q000502:physiology*
chemical_list: D010675:Pheromones; D012724:Sex Attractants