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The study's implications for how whales are cared for are

Feb. 19, 2019 by Catherine Pope

The study's implications for how whales are cared for are still unclear. Some scientists believe that a more thorough survey of whale carcasses might shed light on whether stress levels have increased or decreased over time. But while some whales in the lab may be stressed by the same things they're doing, others may be not. Researchers at the Max Planck Institute for Marine Research in Germany found that the stress levels of a pod whale in the German waters of the Far East were slightly higher than those of a wild orcas in the North Atlantic in 2002.

The study's results have implications for other areas of marine research. In the U.S., scientists reported finding whale mortality rates nearly twice that of orcas. A study published in the journal PLOS Biology in 2005 found that orcas in the wild were more likely than wild whales to die from the lack of oxygen they receive.

The study's findings could also open new pathways for studying whales and humans. A new research team led by Dr. Richard Leff at the University of California, Berkeley, and his colleagues found that whales who die from disease or stress are more likely to die from other causes, such as obesity, than wild whales, because they're more likely to die from a disease. That suggests that the conditions that result in the stress that whales are exposed to are not only worse than normal conditions but also contribute to their mortality rates.

"We have been working on this for years now and now we are ready to go into the future," said Leff. "We are trying to get better at this, and we think we can do it, but we can't do it without understanding the biology of what whales are like in the wild."You'll find information about your home with the help of these tools:

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