SCIENCE LAB SCHEMES : SKILLFUL SEA LION

THE CALIFORNIA sea lion Ronan probably has better rhythm than you.

In 2013, scientists showed that Ronan, a resident of the Long Marine Laboratory at the University of California, Santa Cruz, was the first nonhuman mammal who could be trained to keep a beat, including moving in time with music.

That was when Ronan was young, so researchers recently decided to test the 15-year-old sea lion's skills again.

Parrots keep a beat by moving their bodies.  And other studies have highlighted the beat-keeping capabilities of monkeys and rats. But after more than a decade, '' Ronan the sea lion's rhythmic entertainment is clearly the best known in nonhuman vertebrates,'' said Tecumseh Fitch, a cognitive biologist at the University of Vienna who wasn't involved in the study, Published in the journal Scientific Reports.

The researchers trained Rnan for a few months and then compared her abilities with those she had when she was 3-year old - showing that she had improved her skills as she matured.

Then the team tested Ronan's ability to move her head in time with tempos of 112, 120 and 128 beats per minute and compared it with the ability of 10 people aged 18 to 23 to move their arm in time with those same tempos.

In every parameter tested, Ronan was head of the class.

'' There was no human that was better than  Ronan on every measure of precision and consistency,'' said Peter Cook, a cognitive neuroscientist at New College of Florida.

'' And she was better than most humans on all measures, so he really rose to the top.''

The World Students Society thanks Gennaro Tomma.