Scientists discover sperm whale 'phonetic alphabet'

Scientists studying sperm whales have discovered that they communicate through a sort of "phonetic alphabet", enabling them to build a rough equivalent of what humans refer to as words and phrases. The study, published on Tuesday, involved sperm whales living around the Caribbean island of Dominica, describing how they communicate by squeezing air through their respiratory systems to make rapid clicks resembling Morse code, with sets of the noises making up the basic building blocks of language. Research showed the "expressivity" of sperm whale calls was bigger than previously thought, said Pratyusha Sharma, a lead author of the study, which was published in the journal Nature Communications. "We do not know yet what they are saying. We are studying the calls in their behavioural contexts next to understand what sperm whales might be communicating about," she said.