Animal-like Behavior Research Articles

Qualitative and quantitative analysis of fresh water protozoa from Godavari River

Protozoa are a diverse group of single-celled eukaryotes that play a crucial role in the mineralization of nutrients in soil, making them available for use by plants and other soil organisms. They are often informally referred to as “one-celled animals” due to their animal-like behaviors, such as motility and predation, and lack of a cell wall found in plants and many algae. Protozoa can be either free-living or parasitic, and they feed on organic matter such as other microorganisms or organic tissues and debris. Reproduction in protozoa can be sexual or asexual, with most protozoa reproducing asexually through binary fission. Both isogamy and anisogamy occur in protozoa, with anisogamy being the more common form of sexual reproduction. Protozoa also play an important role in the food chain of aquatic environments. Many species of protozoa living in polluted water feed upon organic matter, which provides food for insect larvae and worms. This organic matter is then consumed by larger animals such as fish, lobster, and crabs, ultimately making its way into the human food chain. In the Godavari River, major protozoa species include Paramecium, Euglena, Coleps, and Bursaridium difficile.

Conversion in Depictions of Anthropomorphic Animals in Picture Books

Picture books are familiar media for children and have a great influence on children's development. Particularly, narrative picture books contribute to the development of children's imagination and provide the basis of rich cultural life throughout their lives. There are many animals depicted in picture books. Animals in narrative picture books for children often appear anthropomorphized, and depictions of animals sometimes mix real and anthropomorphic characteristics. This study focused on conversions of animals in picture books between anthropomorphic and non-anthropomorphic forms. In 591 picture books, 1,930 cases of conversion were observed. In stories with human characters, many conversions involved cats and dogs and changes from non-anthropomorphic animals to anthropomorphic forms. The main triggers of temporary conversions were human or animal-like behaviors and emotions of the characters, while the main causes of long-term conversions were the structures of the stories and character movement to different worlds or into space. The backgrounds of the conversions were deeply related to the social image of animals and to human-animal interactions. Conversion highlights the boundaries between animals and humans and conveys impressive scenes to children which should stimulate child development. The depiction related to children's development in picture books would be one of the reasons why animal picture books are so popular among children.

Coupled Active Systems Encode an Emergent Hunting Behavior in the Unicellular Predator Lacrymaria olor.

Many single-celled protists use rapid morphology changes to perform fast animal-like behaviors. To understand how such behaviors are encoded, we analyzed the hunting dynamics of the predatory ciliate Lacrymaria olor, which locates and captures prey using the tip of a slender "neck" that can rapidly extend more than seven times its body length (500μm from its body) and retract in seconds. By tracking single cells in real-time over hours and analyzing millions of sub-cellular postures, we find that these fast extension-contraction cycles underlie an emergent hunting behavior that comprehensively samples a broad area within the cell's reach. Although this behavior appears complex, we show that it arises naturally as alternating sub-cellular ciliary and contractile activities rearrange the cell's underlying helical cytoskeleton to extend or retract the neck. At short timescales, a retracting neck behaves like an elastic filament under load, such that compression activates a series of buckling modes that reorient the head and scramble its extensile trajectory. At longer timescales, the fundamental length of this filament can change, altering the location in space where these transitions occur. Coupling these fast and slow dynamics together, we present a simple model for how Lacrymaria samples the range of geometries and orientations needed to ensure dense stochastic sampling of the immediate environment when hunting to locate and strike at prey. More generally, coupling active mechanical and chemical signaling systems across different timescales may provide a general strategy by which mechanically encoded emergent cell behaviors can be understood or engineered.

Modeling of dielectric elastomer oscillators for soft biomimetic applications

Biomimetic, entirely soft robots with animal-like behavior and integrated artificial nervous systems will open up totally new perspectives and applications. However, until now, most presented studies on soft robots were limited to only partly soft designs, since all solutions at least needed conventional, stiff electronics to sense, process signals and activate actuators. We present a novel approach for a set up and the experimental validation of an artificial pace maker that is able to drive basic robotic structures and act as artificial central pattern generator. The structure is based on multi-functional dielectric elastomers (DEs). DE actuators, DE switches and DE resistors are combined to create complex DE oscillators (DEOs). Supplied with only one external DC voltage, the DEO autonomously generates oscillating signals that can be used to clock a robotic structure, control the cyclic motion of artificial muscles in bionic robots or make a whole robotic structure move. We present the basic functionality, derive a mathematical model for predicting the generated signal waveform and verify the model experimentally.

Soft Dielectric Elastomer Oscillators Driving Bioinspired Robots.

Entirely soft robots with animal-like behavior and integrated artificial nervous systems will open up totally new perspectives and applications. To produce them, we must integrate control and actuation in the same soft structure. Soft actuators (e.g., pneumatic and hydraulic) exist but electronics are hard and stiff and remotely located. We present novel soft, electronics-free dielectric elastomer oscillators, which are able to drive bioinspired robots. As a demonstrator, we present a robot that mimics the crawling motion of the caterpillar, with an integrated artificial nervous system, soft actuators and without any conventional stiff electronic parts. Supplied with an external DC voltage, the robot autonomously generates all signals that are necessary to drive its dielectric elastomer actuators, and it translates an in-plane electromechanical oscillation into a crawling locomotion movement. Therefore, all functional and supporting parts are made of polymer materials and carbon. Besides the basic design of this first electronic-free, biomimetic robot, we present prospects to control the general behavior of such robots. The absence of conventional stiff electronics and the exclusive use of polymeric materials will provide a large step toward real animal-like robots, compliant human machine interfaces, and a new class of distributed, neuron-like internal control for robotic systems.

‘Groaning wicked like a maddening dog’: Bestiality, Modernity and Irishness in J. M. Synge’s The Playboy of the

In J. M. Synge’s The Playboy of the Western World, anxieties brought about by Ireland’s colonial modernity are given an especially powerful expression through an extensive recourse to animal imageries. This article proposes to read these imageries as indexes of (pre-) modernity, and as markers of the divide between rural and urban areas that modernity accentuated. It argues that the animal-like behaviour that Synge’s play calls for may be considered as a form of resistance to a hegemonic and early twentieth century conception of modernity. Alongside the trained, performing, modern Irish body that emerged in the theatre of the early 1900s there survived vestiges of a radically different form of embodiment associated with, for example, rural performance traditions such as faction fighting or keening. It was these other expressions of corporeality - less easily legible and more beastly - which piqued Synge’s interest and which, in Playboy, offer traces of an inexpungible and co-existing alternative to the modernity of the (Abbey) theatre as an institution.

Clinical Lycanthropy: Delusional Misidentification of the “Self”

Clinical Lycanthropy: Delusional Misidentification of the “Self”

Evidence for Cnidaria-like behavior in ca. 560 Ma Ediacaran Aspidella

The first appearance of animals in the geological record is a matter of continuing debate: how deep were the roots of the Cambrian explosion? Molecular clock estimates indicate that the deepest divergences of the Metazoa had occurred by the Ediacaran Period (635–541 Ma), yet evidence of animal activity from well below the Ediacaran-Cambrian boundary has been rare and often questionable. Meanwhile, the Ediacaran macrobiota has remained enigmatic, as emphasized by recent controversial claims that South Australia Ediacaran forms were not marine animals at all, but land-based lichens and microbial colonies. Here we report evidence for animal-like behavior in a submerged setting in a key Ediacaran form, Aspidella terranovica Billings 1872, a discoidal fossil from the ca. 560 Ma Fermeuse Formation of Newfoundland (Canada). We describe sedimentary fabrics indicating progressive vertical movement of an organism through sediment in response to an aggrading sediment-water interface. Such equilibrium traces are familiar from the Phanerozoic and are observed in partially buried marine animals such as tube anemones today. Furthermore, horizontal trails closely comparable to trails previously described from ∼565 m.y. old Mistaken Point (Newfoundland) are now linked to Aspidella . Our findings constitute evidence of both vertical and horizontal movement in a key Ediacaran taxon, consistent with an animal of cnidarian grade. Moreover, because Aspidella is also reported from the Rawnsley Quartzite of South Australia, our evidence conflicts with the proposed radical interpretation of that Ediacaran fossil assemblage. We demonstrate that at least some Ediacaran forms were probably early animals, and that they lived underwater.

Epicurean Cannibalism, or France Gone Savage

This article explores the figure of the Epicurean-as-cannibal in the Doctrine curieuse des beaux esprits de ce temps, ou pretendus tels (1623) by the French Jesuit priest Garasse. The Doctrine was drafted as an attack on the poet Theophile de Viau and his ‘Epicurean’ entourage, and was instrumental in transforming the French literary field of the early seventeenth century. Garasse uses the figure of the cannibal to locate Epicureans outside the civilized, Catholic, and human community. Cannibalism comes to signify transgressive, animal-like behaviour based on immanent desire as opposed to civilized behaviour guided by external law, while the cannibal serves as a figure for the heretical body that threatens to devour French youth. After comparing Theophile and Epicureans to cannibalistic peoples, Garasse moves on to associate them with cannibalistic animals in order to depict the supposed danger they represented to the Christian French body politic.

Design of a Multimodal Climbing and Gliding Robotic Platform

Animals often exhibit the ability to operate in and transition between multiple modes of locomotion efficiently and elegantly. On the other hand, bioinspired robotic platforms have typically focused on emulating animal-like behavior in a single mode of locomotion. This paper presents the conceptual development, design, and verification of a robotic platform capable of locomotion in scansorial and aerial regimes. The resulting ICAROS platform demonstrates climbing prepared vertical surfaces and transitioning to a glide path with performance characteristics comparable to its biological counterparts.

Towards realization of multi-terrestrial locomotion: decentralized control of a sheet-like robot based on the scaffold-exploitation mechanism

Autonomous decentralized control is an attractive concept for designing robots that can exhibit highly adaptive animal-like behaviour. However, despite its appeal, previous robots based on this scheme could only adapt to a limited number of environments. Our hypothesis it that this problem can be overcome by simply implementing a scaffold-exploitation mechanism. We draw our inspiration from flatworms, which move over various terrains using their two-dimensional sheet-like body, and we design an autonomous decentralized control scheme for a similar robot based on the scaffold-exploitation mechanism. Simulation results show that a robot with the proposed control scheme can move efficiently over various irregular terrains. Our control scheme is not specific to a certain environment, but will be applicable in any environment; it could thus form the basis for developing a multi-terrestrial robot whose working area covers land, sea and even air.

Ferox Femina : Agrippina Maior In Tacitus’s Annales

On 10 October 19 C.E., Germanicus, the popular heir apparent to Tiberius, died, allegedly poisoned by Piso and Plancina, the couple whose prosecution for misconduct in the East is memorialized in the senatus consultum de Cn. Pisone patre. (1) On his deathbed, as Tacitus narrates, Germanicus advised his wife Agrippina, the granddaughter of Augustus and the daughter of Julia Maior, as follows: tum ad uxorem versus per memoriam sui, per communis liberos oravit exueret ferociam, saevienti fortunae summitteret animum, neu regressa in urbem aemulatione potentiae validiores inritaret. haec palam et alia secreto per quae ostendisse credebatur metum ex Tiberio. (2) Then, turning to his wife he begged her, by her memory of him, by their mutual children, to cast aside her defiance, to submit her spirit to the savagery of fortune, and not, on her return to the City, to goad her superiors in power by rivaling them for it. These words openly; others were in secret, by which he was believed to have shown dread of Tiberius. (3) Germanicus, therefore, told Agrippina to put aside her harsh manner (ferociam) and to soften her spirit in the face of savage fortune, and also cautioned her not to provoke those more powerful than her in a competition (aemulatione) for power. And, finally, while he openly (palam) made these remarks to Agrippina, he said more to her privately, warning her of danger (so it was said) from Tiberius. In this deathbed scene and, indeed, throughout the Annales, the vocabulary Tacitus uses to describe Agrippina resounds with words that, like ferocia, typically describe fierce, angry, and even savage, animal-like behavior. (4) The adjective ferox and others like it--atrox (cruel, dreadful, unrelenting) and contumax (unyielding, defiant, willfully disobedient to civil authority)--have typically been interpreted as laudatory if applied to a man, indicating a bold, fighting spirit, but wholly pejorative when applied to a woman. (5) Modern commentators of Tacitus have judged the qualities of being warlike, savage, fierce, and stubborn as appropriate for a soldier but less so for the respectable Roman matrona. (6) Does this choice of language imply that Tacitus the historian had a negative opinion of Agrippina? A number of scholars assert that the above and similar passages are Tacitus's own unfavorable judgments of Agrippina. (7) While I do not seek to rehabilitate the memory of Agrippina, nor to condemn it, I would like to suggest that our appreciation of the subtleties of the Tacitus's portraits of Agrippina might be enhanced by a detailed analysis of his characteristic use of ambiguity. Scholars all too often have tended to think in terms of absolutes, in this case, of whether or not Tacitus was a misogynist. (8) Some argue that Tacitus admired Agrippina's tragic heroism, while still others would have Tacitus condemn Agrippina's transgression of traditional gender boundaries. (9) I do not think that Tacitus worked with such a harsh contrast of absolutes, of extremes of the spectrum, but rather he painted his portraits in shades of grey, understanding the complexity of human nature and appreciating that most characters, men and women, have their share of both virtues and vices. (10) This technique ultimately leaves to the reader the subjective judgment of whether Agrippina was a heroine or a villain. Thus, while I will argue that Tacitus's use of typically pejorative adjectives in describing Agrippina need not be understood as harshly as they have often been interpreted, I appreciate that Tacitean style is such that a multiplicity of meanings can be gleaned from the text. Notwithstanding, I will also argue that Tacitus does not necessarily view Agrippina's ferocia unfavorably. (11) Don Fowler's (2000, 40-63) discussion of deviant focalization in the Aeneid provides a useful paradigm of how it is possible to separate the narrator's (in this case, Tacitus's) authorial voice from the point of view (focalizer) represented in his narrative. …

Lycanthropy in Byzantine times (AD 330—1453)

In this paper, the original Greek language texts of the Byzantine medical literature about lycanthropy are reviewed. The transformation of a human being into a wolf and the adoption of animal-like behaviour, which were already known from mythology and had been presented in the scientific works of ancient Greek and Roman physicians, were examined by six Byzantine physicians and explained as a type of melancholic depression or mania. In spite of the influence of Byzantine medicine, its rationality in the interpretation of lycanthropy was forgotten in medieval and Renaissance times when it was replaced by explanations based on demonic possession and witchcraft. More recently psychiatry has treated the phenomenon as a subject of medical inquiry and has again explained the condition in terms of mental disorder.

Lessons from slime mold: How to survive and thrive in ever‐changing organizational environments

Kate Rutter is a senior practitioner at Adaptive Path. She blogs at www.adaptivepath.com or at her personal site www.intelleto.com. Her email address is kate adaptivepath.com. I magine you’re in a forest, surrounded by majestic towering trees. Underfoot is the soft, leafy, damp forest floor. Taking a seat on a fallen log, you arch the kinks out of your hunched shoulders, shake off the stress of the office and take a deep breath of fragrant, moist air. You ask yourself why work feels like you are part of a never-ending rat race...and you wonder...will it ever stop? How are you going to spearhead that major project or work with a new cross-functional team and deliver great results when the organizational environment hampers you? Much as I hate to interrupt your well-earned contemplation, I’m compelled to inform you that on the underside of the log you are sitting on is a life form teeming with insight about organizational behavior. Throughout the seemingly quiet forest, thousands of spores are performing an age-old dance, expressing quietly the tactics of surviving and thriving in this dynamic and ever-changing wooded environment. Say “hello” to slime mold. This lower fungus has evolved a clear set of survival techniques that are potent lessons for people grappling with challenges posed by shifting companies and markets. Who knew that insights into survival could be found literally under your feet? For years, biologists, botanists, media moguls, artists, authors and technologists have been captivated by the sophistication and tenacity of the slime mold lifecycle and the slime mold’s ability to morph from plant-like to animal-like behaviors in constant sync with the environment. I’m not a biologist. I’m a designer working in the field of digital products, information architecture and interaction design. But over the past eight years, I’ve been entranced with slime mold as a compelling metaphor for organizational development. In my work as an employee, manager, director and consultant, I’ve observed how organizations and teams shift in response to external forces, and I’ve found trends and patterns for acclimating and adapting to change. This article shares the examples that I’ve observed and explores possibilities and approaches for how businesses and people in them can better adapt to a rate of change that is rapidly becoming the standard for doing business. By using slime mold as a learning tool, we can identify practical tips and tools for surviving, thriving and doing great work in even the toughest of environments. This fascinating life form holds intriguing lessons for today’s knowledge worker... from sensing and responding to environments that become hostile to using the power of signals to create alignment and collective action.

Vesicular secretion of auxin

The plant hormone auxin is secreted in root apices via phospholipase Dζ2 (PLDζ2) activity which produces specific population of phosphatidic acid that stimulates secretion of vesicles enriched with auxin. These vesicles were reported to be localized at plant synapses which are active in auxin secretion, especially at the transition zone of the root apex. There are several implications of this vesicular secretion of auxin. In root apices, auxin emerges as plant neurotransmitter-like signal molecule which coordinates activities of adjacent cells via electric and chemical signaling. Putative quantal release of auxin after electrical stimulation, if confirmed, would be part of neuronal communication between plant cells. As auxin transport across plant synapses is tightly linked with integrated sensory perception of environment, especially of omnipresent gravity and light, auxin is proposed to mediate the plant perception of environment. These neuronal features allow sessile plants to integrate multitude of sensory signals into the adaptive behavior of whole plants and the animal-like exploratory behavior of growing roots.

Animal-like behavior design of small robots by consciousness-based architecture

This paper proposes an aproach to designing animal-like behavior of autonomous robots with use of a five-layered hierarchical model of the relation between consciousness and behavior. The hierarchy of behavior includes reflex motion, detour, and a limited use of temporal and spatial information of environments. The corresponding consciousness has an emotion-valued coordinate system, stably lasting emotion that enables an animal to detour an obstacle for a prey, and symbolic information on time and space. The basic idea of the software architecture realizing the above model of consciousness and behavior is that a level in the hierarchy of consciousness is activated when an action on the immediately lower level is obstructed and that the activated level of consciousness selects and drives a higher behavior. With this software architecture, all the five levels of behavior were successfully shown by experiment with the use of two small mobile robots. Their instantaneous consciousness is visualized on the screen of a host computer controling robot motion and the screen image of the robot's consciousness works to design behaviors as a bilateral human interface.

Animal-like Behavior Design of Small Robots by the Model of Subjective World and Behavior

Animal-like Behavior Design of Small Robots by the Model of Subjective World and Behavior

The moral elevation of animals: The case of ?gorillas in the mist?

All cultures provide their members with ways to understand differ? ences between animals and humans and with ideas of appropriate "human" or "animal" behavior. Conceptions of animals in pre-modern societies are part of an integral conceptual system where there is considerable agree? ment about world view and ethos. For example, the Balinese characterize animals as hairy beings who walk on four legs and have sharp teeth. Hu? mans must separate themselves from any animal-like behavior. They must be hairless, walk on two legs and have flat teeth. To keep a clear separation between human and animal, the Balinese do not allow babies to crawl, file their teeth flat at puberty and view hairy people (e.g. Europeans) as ani? mal-like demons. In modern technological societies, however, these conceptual systems lose their integrity and become a complexly interwoven proliferation of cul? tural beliefs about humans and animals (cf. Berger 1979, Levy 1972). For example, in modern America, there are a variety of belief systems which people can use to address human/animal distinctiveness. Human/animal re? lationships assume variegated forms ranging from animals as "family" mem? bers ("children in fur coats"), animals as property, or for human consumption to idealized beings in need of protection. Under the condition of modernity, the semantics of everyday life (those systems of meanings people use to interpret their participation in society) become highly multifaceted and multi-vocal (Frank 1987). Con? trasted with traditional culture, where the range of answers to fundamental questions is less diverse, in contemporary society there is no single system to impart consistent meaning to the daily actions of everyone (Swidler, 1986). With regard to distinctions between animals and humans, we might expect mutifaceted and multi-vocal expressions as indicators of ideological competition for meaning. For example, Kellert (1978, 1988) surveyed a

Children who Run on all Fours: and other Animal-like Behaviors in the Human Child

SOME thirty years ago, Dr. Hrdlička, travelling in Mexico with Carl Lumholtz, saw an Indian child, well advanced in his second year, who ran about on all fours with hands and feet flat on the ground, knees slightly bent, body not far from the horizontal, and the head nearly in a line with the body. He was much struck by this unusual quadrupoid type of locomotion, very different from the young child's usual creeping, and obviously suggestive of the walking of gorilla, chimpanzee, and orang utan, when these apes are on all fours and not trying to be bipedal. There is this difference, however, that these apes rest their fore weight on their knuckles, and that the orang rests its hind weight on the outer edge of its foot.

Children Who Run on All Fours, and Other Animal-Like Behaviors in the Human Child

Children Who Run on All Fours, and Other Animal-Like Behaviors in the Human Child