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Bob Montgomerie and co-authors show that female promiscuity promotes the evolution of faster sperm.Sperm competition is a powerful evolutionary force that can shape sperm traits. Montgomerie and co-authors examined sperm characteristics of 29 closely related species of cichlids from Lake Tanganyika. In a paper published in the prestigious journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Science the authors provide phylogenetically robust evidence that species experiencing greater levels of sperm competition have faster-swimming sperm, and further show that sperm competition selects for increases in the number, size, and longevity of spermatozoa in the ejaculate of a male. ... more