Nobel Prize was awarded for the study of "zebra" camouflage for cows

Japanese scientists have won the Nobel Prize in Biology for a study that showed how camouflage in the form of black and white stripes on cows helps reduce the frequency of attacks by horseflies and other blood-sucking insects. The results of the award ceremony were published on the official website of the award on September 19.

"We are very pleased to receive this award for the fact that we were actually able to demonstrate that blood—sucking flies are much less likely to attack cows if they are covered with stripes similar to those found on zebra skins," Tomoki Kojima, researcher at the National Organization for Agricultural and Food Research of Japan, said at the ceremony.

The study was published in October 2019. In it, scientists examined how applying zebra stripes to cows affects the behavior of horseflies. Earlier, British scientists found that zebra stripes prevent insects from determining the distance to a potential victim, which became the basis for the experiment. Studies have shown that such stripes reduce the number of horsefly bites by half.

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In January 2024, Chinese scientists cloned two endangered species of Tibetan cows for the first time. It was clarified that experts had chosen the Zhangmu and Apeijiaza breeds found in Tibet for cloning. As a result, four male calves of each breed were bred in January.

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