Author: Ajay Narendra, Associate Professor of Insect Neuroethology, Macquarie University

Jumping spiders – one of the largest spider families – get their name from the extraordinary jumps they make to hunt prey, to navigate and also to evade predators. Male jumping spiders also jump to escape from cannibalistic females and competing males. So they are under tremendous pressure to jump efficiently and rapidly. We studied the jumping abilities of miniature male and female Australian peacock spiders. We found that the males – incredibly light creatures, weighing just 2 milligrams – have the highest acceleration among any known jumping spider. Our study is the first to explore and identify differences in…