2023-10-18 06:36:57
The cats meow. From an anatomical point of view, this is not surprising. On the other hand, their vocal cords should not allow them to purr. And yet…
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A dull, regular sound. A feeling of well-being. The purring of a cat. Scientists have long remained speechless in the face of this ability. Because generally, the sounds emitted by a mammal are related to its size. Or more precisely with the size of his vocal cords. The longer they are, the lower the frequency of the sounds can be. Thus, the vocal cords of our cats are in principle too short to produce sounds of 20 to 30 hertz. So how do they purr?
Finding the secret of purring in the larynx of cats
To finally understand, researchers from the University of Vienna (Austria) cut out the larynx – this tube in the neck in which the famous vocal cords are hidden – of eight deceased domestic cats. They say in the newspaper Current Biology how they thus discovered that the larynxes might emit a purr when simply passing through air. For this, there is no need for muscle contraction under neuronal impulses, as they have suspected for some time.
Do cats purr without muscle contraction?
And what makes it all possible are connective tissue structures that scientists had already identified in cat larynxes. Without until now, associating them with purring. But they do make it possible to lower the frequency of sounds emitted when a cat purrs by making its vocal cords heavier.
However, the researchers do not exclude the possibility that a muscle contraction mechanism might complete the picture in living cats. To amplify the purring a little more.
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