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

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This is Scientific American 60-second science. I'm Dina Fine Marin. Got a minute?

Women have a biological cap on the reproductive years.

And from an evolutionary standpoint, researchers have long wondered why human female longevity extends well-past fertility.

Other than humans, only short-finned pilot whales and killer whales live three or more decades after menopause, some even reaching their 90s.

Male whales, which are far less likely to be followed by groupmates than our females, seldom survive past 50.

Now a study of killer whales offer some clues about why evolution may have selected for such long life.

Older females have accrued what the study authors call repositories of ecological knowledge

that can help their entire group survive.

The researchers examined more than 750 hours of killer whale video.

They saw that older-wise and females were the individuals most likely to

lead younger whales to salmon feeding grounds, especially during lean times. The study

is in the journal Current Biology. The work provides the first evidence the

the advantage conferred via the knowledge held by elderly female whales may be behind

the adaptation for their post-fertility

longevity. In humans, an analogous explanation for postmenopausal longevity is part of what's

called the grandmother effect, the constellation of attributes that make older women especially

valuable to the community. Whale grandmas appear to be highly valuable too.

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