Diverse motives for human curiosity.

Curiosity-our desire to know-is a fundamental drive in human behaviour, but its mechanisms are poorly understood. A classical question concerns the curiosity motives. What drives individuals to become curious about some but not other sources of information? Here we show that curiosity about probabilistic events depends on multiple aspects of the distribution of these events.

Eye movements reveal epistemic curiosity in human observers.

Saccadic (rapid) eye movements are primary means by which humans and non-human primates sample visual information. However, while saccadic decisions are intensively investigated in instrumental contexts where saccades guide subsequent actions, it is largely unknown how they may be influenced by curiosity - the intrinsic desire to learn. While saccades are sensitive to visual novelty and visual surprise, no study has examined their relation to epistemic curiosity - interest in symbolic, semantic information.

The effects of task difficulty, novelty and the size of the search space on intrinsically motivated exploration.

Devising efficient strategies for exploration in large open-ended spaces is one of the most difficult computational problems of intelligent organisms. Because the available rewards are ambiguous or unknown during the exploratory phase, subjects must act in intrinsically motivated fashion. However, a vast majority of behavioral and neural studies to date have focused on decision making in reward-based tasks, and the rules guiding intrinsically motivated exploration remain largely unknown.

Information-seeking, curiosity, and attention: computational and neural mechanisms.

Intelligent animals devote much time and energy to exploring and obtaining information, but the underlying mechanisms are poorly understood. We review recent developments on this topic that have emerged from the traditionally separate fields of machine learning, eye movements in natural behavior, and studies of curiosity in psychology and neuroscience. These studies show that exploration may be guided by a family of mechanisms that range from automatic biases toward novelty or surprise to systematic searches for learning progress and information gain in curiosity-driven behavior.

Ocular development in the oman shark, Iago omanensis (Triakidae), Gulf of Aqaba, Red Sea.

Ocular ontogenesis was studied in embryos of the placental viviparous shark, Iago omanensis, abundant in the Gulf of Aqaba, Red Sea, at depths of 150-1500 meters. Samples of gravid females were collected bi-monthly, and their embryos extracted. The eyes of 220 of those embryos of various dimensions were dissected and routinely prepared for histological and electron microscopic studies.

Morphological and cytological ontogenesis of the ampullae of lorenzini and lateral line canals in the Oman shark, Iago omanensis Norman 1939 (Triakidae), from the Gulf of Aqaba, Red Sea.

The Oman shark, Iago omanensis, is a small, placental viviparous species encountered in great numbers in the deeper waters of the Gulf of Aqaba, Red Sea. It reproduces year-round, providing an opportunity to study ontogenesis of organ systems at various stages of development. This study examines the morphological and cytological development of the mechanoreceptive lateral line (LL) system and the electrosensory Ampullae of Lorenzini.

Distribution, morphology, and cytology of ampullae of Lorenzini in the Oman shark, Iago omanensis (Triakidae), from the Gulf of Aqaba, Red Sea.

Ampullae of Lorenzini are electrosensitive organs that, together with the olfactory organs, form the main sensory systems for foraging and navigation in skates, rays, and sharks. In sharks, these organs are mainly found on the rostral part of the head. This study describes the morphology and cytology of the ampullar system in the Oman shark, Iago omanensis, which is common in the Red Sea.

Observations on the Oman Shark, Iago omanensis (Triakidae), with emphasis on the morphological and cytological changes of the oviduct and yolk sac during gestation.

The shark Iago omanensis (Triakidae, Selachia) is encountered in large populations in the Gulf of Aqaba, Red Sea, at depths of 150-1,500 m. It is a placental viviparous species, reproductive all year round and giving birth to four (occasionally five) young of 170- to 180-mm total length (TL). Its distribution and morphometrics, as well as histological and cytological changes in the oviducts, were studied.

Ontogenesis and cytomorphology of the nasal olfactory organs in the Oman shark, Iago omanensis (Triakidae), in the Gulf of Aqaba, Red Sea.

Background: Sharks (Selachi) are among the largest predators in deep and shallow seas, feeding on live and dead prey. Olfaction is one of the central senses by which they forage, especially at night and in deep water. The organs responsible for this function are the olfactory rosettes, which are situated in their nares.