A comprehensive neuroanatomical survey of the Lobula Plate Tangential Neurons with predictions for their optic flow sensitivity.

Flying insects exhibit remarkable navigational abilities controlled by their compact nervous systems. , the pattern of changes in the visual scene induced by locomotion, is a crucial sensory cue for robust self-motion estimation, especially during rapid flight. Neurons that respond to specific, large-field optic flow patterns have been studied for decades, primarily in large flies, such as houseflies, blowflies, and hover flies.

Synaptic targets of photoreceptors specialized to detect color and skylight polarization in .

Color and polarization provide complementary information about the world and are detected by specialized photoreceptors. However, the downstream neural circuits that process these distinct modalities are incompletely understood in any animal. Using electron microscopy, we have systematically reconstructed the synaptic targets of the photoreceptors specialized to detect color and skylight polarization in , and we have used light microscopy to confirm many of our findings.