The optomotor response of the praying mantis is driven predominantly by the central visual field

Vivek Nityananda,Ignacio Serrano-Pedraza,Ghaith Tarawneh,Jenny Read,Steven Errington

doi:10.1007/s00359-016-1139-3

Vivek Nityananda, Ignacio Serrano-Pedraza + Show 3 more

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.1007/s00359-016-1139-3

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Abstract

The optomotor response has been widely used to investigate insect sensitivity to contrast and motion. Several studies have revealed the sensitivity of this response to frequency and contrast, but we know less about the spatial integration underlying this response. Specifically, few studies have investigated how the horizontal angular extent of stimuli influences the optomotor response. We presented mantises with moving gratings of varying horizontal extents at three different contrasts in the central or peripheral regions of their visual fields. We assessed the relative effectivity of different regions to elicit the optomotor response and modelled the dependency of the response on the angular extent subtended by stimuli at these different regions. Our results show that the optomotor response is governed by stimuli in the central visual field and not in the periphery. The model also shows that in the central region, the probability of response increases linearly with increase in horizontal extent up to a saturation point. Furthermore, the dependency of the optomotor response on the angular extent of the stimulus is modulated by contrast. We discuss the implications of our results for different modes of stimulus presentation and for models of the underlying mechanisms of motion detection in the mantis.

Highlights

The optomotor response is a behaviour that has been widely used to investigate insect vision (Reichardt and Wenking 1969; Pick and Buchner 1979; Reichardt and Guo 1986)
When gratings were presented in the peripheral regions (Fig. 5, right column), mantises did not respond to the lower grating extents and only responded to gratings subtending angles greater than 85°
If we look at the actual areas covered by stimuli on the screen for these grating extents (Fig. 2), we see that stimuli encroaching from the periphery do not elicit the optomotor response until they start overlapping with the central ~85°

Summary

Introduction

The optomotor response is a behaviour that has been widely used to investigate insect vision (Reichardt and Wenking 1969; Pick and Buchner 1979; Reichardt and Guo 1986). To study the optomotor response in the laboratory, yaw (self-motion about the dorsoventral axis, Fig. 1b) is best simulated by presenting stimuli on a rotating cylinder around the insect (Reichardt and Wenking 1969; Pick and Buchner 1979; Reichardt and Guo 1986) while lateral translation perpendicular to the line of sight (Fig. 1a) is best simulated by presenting stimuli on a planar monitor screen (Dvorak et al 1980; Srinivasan and Dvorak 1980; Nityananda et al 2015). Expect different results in praying mantises compared to flying insects without foveae, which are likely to experience predominantly translation parallel to the line of sight, generating radial flow, and rotational motion

Methods

Experimental setup

Experimental procedure

Results

Discussion

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