Freya Adele Pappert

Abstract Intermittent fasting is widely promoted for its potential to improve health and extend lifespan, yet these benefits may come at a reproductive cost, potentially reducing parental fitness and offspring quality. While the inter- and transgenerational effects of fasting are increasingly studied, they remain poorly understood in species with unconventional reproductive roles.

1 Introduction Females and males have distinct reproductive strategies, leading to specific energy allocation. Females typically invest more in reproduction than males, often through a combination of costlier games and greater parental care (Trivers 1972). For example, in many taxa, females produce energetically expensive eggs and bear additional burdens, such as pregnancy and lactation (Hayward and Gillooly 2011; Speakman 2008).

Abstract Caloric restriction (CR) studies have traditionally focused on species with conventional reproductive roles, emphasizing female's greater investment in costly gametes and parental care. While the divergent impact of CR on males and females is evident across species, the factors driving this variation, i.e., resource allocation to reproductive elements as part of distinct life history strategies, remain unclear.