Matching Items (3)
Filtering by

Clear all filters

136790-Thumbnail Image.png
Description
Communication amongst eusocial insect is key to their success. Ants rely on signaling to mediate many different functions within a colony such as policing and nest mate recognition. Camponotus floridanus uses chemosensory signaling in the form of cuticular hydrocarbons to regulate these functions. Each cuticular hydrocarbon profile contains numerous hydrocarbons,

Communication amongst eusocial insect is key to their success. Ants rely on signaling to mediate many different functions within a colony such as policing and nest mate recognition. Camponotus floridanus uses chemosensory signaling in the form of cuticular hydrocarbons to regulate these functions. Each cuticular hydrocarbon profile contains numerous hydrocarbons, however it is yet to be seen if Camponotus floridanus can discriminate between linear hydrocarbons of similar length. Individual specimens were conditioned in three different ways: 5 conditioning with high concentration of sugar water (1;1 ratio), 1 conditioning with high concentration of sugar water, and 5 conditioning with low concentration of sugar water (1;4). Two linear hydrocarbons were use, C23 and C24, with C23 always being the conditioned stimulus. Specimens who were conditioned 5 times with high concentration of sugar water were the only group to show a significant response to the conditioned stimulus with a p-value of .008 and exhibited discrimination behavior 46% of the time. When compared 5 conditioning with high concentration to the other two testing conditioning groups, 1 conditioning with high concentration produced an insignificant p-value of .13 was obtained whereas when comparing it with 5 conditioning low concentration of sugar a significant p-value of .0132 was obtained. This indiciates that Camponotus floridanus are capable of discrimination however must be conditioned with high concentration of sugar water, while number of conditioning is insignificant.
ContributorsDamari, Ben Aviv (Author) / Liebig, Juergen (Thesis director) / Ghaninia, Majid (Committee member) / Pratt, Stephen (Committee member) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor) / School of Life Sciences (Contributor)
Created2014-05
136060-Thumbnail Image.png
Description
ABSTRACT Communication is vital in the context of everyday life for all organisms, but particularly so in social insects, such as Z. nevadensis. The overall lifestyle and need for altruistic acts of individuals within a colony depends primarily on intracolony chemical communication, with a focus on odorants. The perception of

ABSTRACT Communication is vital in the context of everyday life for all organisms, but particularly so in social insects, such as Z. nevadensis. The overall lifestyle and need for altruistic acts of individuals within a colony depends primarily on intracolony chemical communication, with a focus on odorants. The perception of these odorants is made possible by the chemoreceptive functions of sensilla basiconica and sensilla trichoid which exist on the antennal structure. The present study consists of both a morphological analysis and electrophysiological experiment concerning sensilla basiconica. It attempts to characterize the function of neurons present in sensilla basiconica through single sensillum recordings and contributes to existing literature by determining if a social insect, such as the dampwood termite, is able to perceive a wide spectrum of odorants despite having significantly fewer olfactory receptors than most other social insect species. Results indicated that sensilla basiconica presence significantly out-paced that of sensilla trichoid and sensilla chaetica combined, on all flagellomeres. Analysis demonstrated significant responses to all general odorants and several cuticular hydrocarbons. Combined with the knowledge of fewer olfactory receptors present in this species and their lifestyle, results may indicate a positive association between the the social complexity of an insect's lifestyle and the number of ORs the individuals within that colony possess.
ContributorsMcGlone, Taylor (Author) / Liebig, Juergen (Thesis director) / Ghaninia, Majid (Committee member) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2015-05
168487-Thumbnail Image.png
Description
Information processing in the brain is mediated by network interactions between anatomically distant (centimeters apart) regions of cortex and network action is fundamental to human behavior. Disruptive activity of these networks may allow a variety of diseases to develop. Degradation or loss of network function in the brain can affect

Information processing in the brain is mediated by network interactions between anatomically distant (centimeters apart) regions of cortex and network action is fundamental to human behavior. Disruptive activity of these networks may allow a variety of diseases to develop. Degradation or loss of network function in the brain can affect many aspects of the human experience; motor disorder, language difficulties, memory loss, mood swings, and more. The cortico-basal ganglia loop is a system of networks in the brain between the cortex, basal ganglia, the thalamus, and back to the cortex. It is not one singular circuit, but rather a series of parallel circuits that are relevant towards motor output, motor planning, and motivation and reward. Studying the relationship between basal ganglia neurons and cortical local field potentials may lead to insights about neurodegenerative diseases and how these diseases change the cortico-basal ganglia circuit. Speech and language are uniquely human and require the coactivation of several brain regions. The various aspects of language are spread over the temporal lobe and parts of the occipital, parietal, and frontal lobe. However, the core network for speech production involves collaboration between phonologic retrieval (encoding ideas into syllabic representations) from Wernicke’s area, and phonemic encoding (translating syllables into motor articulations) from Broca’s area. Studying the coactivation of these brain regions during a repetitive speech production task may lead to a greater understanding of their electrophysiological functional connectivity. The primary purpose of the work presented in this document is to validate the use of subdural microelectrodes in electrophysiological functional connectivity research as these devices best match the spatial and temporal scales of brain activity. Neuron populations in the cortex are organized into functional units called cortical columns. These cortical columns operate on the sub-millisecond temporal and millimeter spatial scale. The study of brain networks, both in healthy and unwell individuals, may reveal new methodologies of treatment or management for disease and injury, as well as contribute to our scientific understanding of how the brain works.
ContributorsO'Neill, Kevin John (Author) / Greger, Bradley (Thesis advisor) / Santello, Marco (Committee member) / Helms Tillery, Stephen (Committee member) / Papandreou-Suppapola, Antonia (Committee member) / Kleim, Jeffery (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2021