Increased scent marking in male Mongolian gerbils by urinary polypeptides of female conspecifics

Male Mongolian gerbils scent mark during a standardized openfield test on an individually different but more-or-less constant level in the absence of females. The presence of females in the same room but without direct contact to the males increases the marking frequencies of the males to an individually different higher level. A similar increase in marking frequency is obtained by application of female urine directly to the nostrils of the males, but not by male gerbil urine or female laboratory mouse urine. This indicates that substances present in female gerbil urine are responsible for the increase in male marking behavior. Using this bioassay, various fractions of female urine were tested for their influence on marking behavior. Our results to date show that the component increasing male scent-marking behavior is hydrophilic and nonvolatile and is contained in the nondialyzable, high-molecular-weight polypeptide fraction of female gerbil urine.