bios podcast      Illustration: Meghan Rock Complex vibrations
can make or break the courtship dances of spiders. Helen Shen
joins Berkeley biologists to watch. Illustrated by Meghan Rock.
Scientists had long believed that female jumping spiders judged
their suitors on looks alone. Indeed, two marble-like eyes
placed front and center are perfectly suited to detect the
male’s outlandish markings—sometimes scarlet, mustard, and even
electric blue. Researchers first collected subtle purrs from the
males’ energetic rump-shaking about 30 years ago. But their
sound equipment only revealed audible vibrations—a mere sliver
of the earless spiders’ seismic range. No one knew their
purpose.  In the early 2000s, Elias and a handful of scientists
first unlocked an underground world of communication among
spiders and a host of other tiny creatures. Laser technology
once reserved for industrial engineers and spies unveiled this
hidden realm. Elias discovered that seismic songs serve as more
than background music for jumpi