Understanding the human body is a team effort. That's where the Yachtel group comes in.

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This is Scientific Americans' 60-second science. I'm Jason Goldman. Got a minute?

River otters, like other social animals, have to carefully weigh the costs and benefits of hanging out in large groups.

A big group makes it easier to catch fish, which seems like a good deal, but there's a downside to social life too. More otters means more

chances for disease transmission, for example, or for aggressive conflict. So they balance these

pressures by living in what researchers call a fission fusion society. So there's this constant

dynamic of splitting and sort of joining into larger groups.

University of Wyoming ecologist Adi Barocas. To understand the factors that drive these

social dynamics, Barocas' team, from the University of Wyoming and the Alaska Department

of Fish and Game, has spent decades spying on the coastal river otters

of Alaska near Prince William Sound. To do it, they use motion-activated camera traps, as well

as implanted radio trackers. The latrins, what we call latrins, which are pretty much communal

toilets that the river otters use, they seem to have an important function in the life of

river otters. That's right, river otter society is organized around the bathroom. It makes good sense.

By investigating a latrine, an otter can sniff out just how many otters there are in the area

and who they might be.

The researchers found the otters performed more signaling behaviors like sniffing, body

rubbing or urinating, than social behaviors, like grooming or play, and what they called

...