The uterus is the hollow, muscular organ where a fetus grows during pregnancy. It’s also where your period blood originates from . You might have heard your biology teacher call it a womb. Clitoris.” Cleveland Clinic, my.clevelandclinic.org/health/body/22823-clitoris. Accessed 27 Oct. 2022.

Bat expert and honorary research associate at the South Australian Museum Terry Reardon, who was not involved with the study, was impressed the researchers could capture so much footage of the bats mating. The fallopian or uterine tubes are two tubes connected to your uterus that transport eggs from the ovaries to the uterus. Consult a healthcare professional if the odor lingers or if you’re experiencing other symptoms, such as itching or burning. Bumps and lumps on the labia

Over time, this can mean males and females of the same species evolve in response to each other as they try to get the upper hand. This is sexual conflict, and can involve changes in body size, characteristics and behaviour.

The study began when Nicolas Fasel, an evolutionary biologist at the University of Lausanne in Switzerland, and his colleagues noticed that the serotine bat ( Eptesicus serotinus) has a rather large and unusual penis. When erect, it is 22% of the bat’s head–body length and has a bulbous, heart-shaped tip. “We were thinking it would be really difficult for it to enter anything,” he says. The male serotine bat ( Eptesicus serotinus) has a penis that, when erect, is around 22% of its body length. Credit: Joel Sartore/Photo Ark via NaturePL Nguyen, John D., and Hieu Duong. “Anatomy, Abdomen and Pelvis, Female External Genitalia.” StatPearls, StatPearls Publishing, 2022. However, thanks to the efforts of a Dutch bat enthusiast who set up 18 video cameras in a church in the Netherlands that was home to a roosting colony of serotine bats, Fasel and his colleagues were able to analyze 93 mating events in detail. Video of an additional four mating events involving the same species came from collaborators at a bat rescue and rehabilitation center in Ukraine. Breast Anatomy.” Cleveland Clinic, my.clevelandclinic.org/health/articles/8330-breast-anatomy. Accessed 27 Oct. 2022.

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While the footage doesn’t prove non-penetrative sex in mammals, some females were left with fluid on their abdomens, suggesting males had at least attempted to deposit their sperm. The scientists now hope to swab females after mating and are building a “bat porn box” to film couples from all angles. But female serotine bats have adapted this structure to act as a defence against unruly males, using it to cover their lower body and protect them from unwanted suitors.

Kreklau A, et al. (2018). Measurements of a ‘normal vulva’ in women aged 15–84: A cross-sectional prospective single-centre study. It’s a bit of an open question how their semen really gets into the female reproductive tract. It might be that there’s kind of suction involved. We cannot fully answer this mechanism,” she said. But not all clitorises are created equal: There isn’t an average clitoris glans size, and some may have a larger or smaller clitoral hood. Hair When researchers discovered that the penis of male serotine bats could be as much as seven times wider and longer than the female’s vagina, they wondered how the species could possibly reproduce.I am not aware of a mammalian species that transfers sperm” without penetration, says Mihaela Pavličev, an evolutionary biologist at the University of Vienna, “so this report describes a unique characteristic”. Prof Paul Racey, a bat expert at the University of Exeter, has witnessed penetrative sex in serotine bats and was sceptical of the findings. “Why would they want to mate without intromission, which runs the risk of ‘wasting’ semen?” he said. But he conceded that given recent revelations about bat sex, he had to be open-minded. So now that we’ve explored the vulva, let’s have a look inside. Female sexual anatomy doesn’t stop at what you see from the outside. Vagina There isn’t a ton of data available on labial measurements, but a study from 2018 has so far been the largest and most comprehensive look into external genitalia length.