Tracking the Body, Wing, and Leg Kinematics of Moving Mosquitoes.

In this protocol, we discuss general techniques for tracking the three-dimensional (3D) locations of the mosquito body, wings, legs, or other features of interest using videos. Tracking data must be acquired to produce detailed kinematics of moving mosquitoes. The software of focus for this protocol, DLTdv, was chosen for its widespread use and excellent support and because it is open-source.

Real-Time Tracking of Multiple Moving Mosquitoes.

Tracking mosquitoes in real time, as opposed to recording video files and performing the tracking step later, is useful for two reasons. The first is efficiency. Real-time tracking requires less storage because video images do not need to be saved and followed by a tracking step.

Using Videography to Study the Biomechanics and Behavior of Freely Moving Mosquitoes.

Female mosquitoes of most species require a blood meal for egg development. When biting a human host to collect this blood meal, they can spread dangerous diseases such as malaria, yellow fever, or dengue. Researchers use videography to study many aspects of mosquito behavior, including in-flight host-seeking, takeoff, and landing behaviors, as well as probing and blood feeding, and more.

Designing a Generic Videography Experiment for Studying Mosquito Behavior.

In this protocol, we describe the basic design considerations and general method to set up a videography system to study mosquito behavior. A basic videography system to study mosquito behavior requires one or more cameras with an optical lens, camera lighting, a calibration setup, and a system to record the video data or otherwise control the camera. Here, we define two types of systems: (1) a real-time videography-based tracking system for determining the position of multiple moving (flying) mosquitoes, and (2) a high-fidelity videography system that can track the detailed movements of body, wings, and legs of a single mosquito at high spatial and temporal resolutions.

Bumblebees land rapidly and robustly using a sophisticated modular flight control strategy.

When approaching a landing surface, many flying animals use visual feedback to control their landing. Here, we studied how foraging bumblebees () use radial optic expansion cues to control in-flight decelerations during landing. By analyzing the flight dynamics of 4,672 landing maneuvers, we showed that landing bumblebees exhibit a series of deceleration bouts, unlike landing honeybees that continuously decelerate.

Effects of drop height, conveyor belt speed, and acceleration on the welfare of broiler chickens in early and later life.

During automated processing in commercial hatcheries, day-old chicks are subjected to a range of possible mental and physical stressors. Three determinants of the processing line seem to have the potential to affect the birds in particular: drop height from one conveyor belt to another, conveyor belt speed, and acceleration. The aim of this study was to evaluate the effects of these 3 factors on chicken health and welfare in early and later life.

Visualizing trypanosomes in a vertebrate host reveals novel swimming behaviours, adaptations and attachment mechanisms.

Trypanosomes are important disease agents of humans, livestock and cold-blooded species, including fish. The cellular morphology of trypanosomes is central to their motility, adaptation to the host's environments and pathogenesis. However, visualizing the behaviour of trypanosomes resident in a live vertebrate host has remained unexplored.

Reorientation and propulsion in fast-starting zebrafish larvae: an inverse dynamics analysis.

Most fish species use fast starts to escape from predators. Zebrafish larvae perform effective fast starts immediately after hatching. They use a C-start, where the body curls into a C-shape, and then unfolds to accelerate.

Estimating the maximum attachment performance of tree frogs on rough substrates.

Tree frogs can attach to smooth and rough substrates using their adhesive toe pads. We present the results of an experimental investigation of tree frog attachment to rough substrates, and of the role of mechanical interlocking between superficial toe pad structures and substrate asperities in the tree frog species Litoria caerulea and Hyla cinerea. Using a rotation platform setup, we quantified the adhesive and frictional attachment performance of whole frogs clinging to smooth, micro-, and macrorough substrates.

Light-dark rhythms during incubation of broiler chicken embryos and their effects on embryonic and post hatch leg bone development.

There are indications that lighting schedules applied during incubation can affect leg health at hatching and during rearing. The current experiment studied effects of lighting schedule: continuous light (24L), 12 hours of light, followed by 12 hours of darkness (12L:12D), or continuous darkness (24D) throughout incubation of broiler chicken eggs on the development and strength of leg bones, and the role of selected hormones in bone development. In the tibiatarsus and femur, growth and ossification during incubation and size and microstructure at day (D)0, D21, and D35 post hatching were measured.

Three-dimensional analysis of the fast-start escape response of the least killifish, .

Fish make C-starts to evade predator strikes. Double-bend (DB) C-starts consist of three stages: Stage 1, in which the fish rapidly bends into a C-shape; Stage 2, in which the fish bends in the opposite direction; and a variable Stage 3. In single-bend (SB) C-starts, the fish immediately straightens after Stage 1.

Automated Reconstruction of Three-Dimensional Fish Motion, Forces, and Torques.

Fish can move freely through the water column and make complex three-dimensional motions to explore their environment, escape or feed. Nevertheless, the majority of swimming studies is currently limited to two-dimensional analyses. Accurate experimental quantification of changes in body shape, position and orientation (swimming kinematics) in three dimensions is therefore essential to advance biomechanical research of fish swimming.

Refraction corrected calibration for aquatic locomotion research: application of Snell's law improves spatial accuracy.

Images of underwater objects are distorted by refraction at the water-glass-air interfaces and these distortions can lead to substantial errors when reconstructing the objects' position and shape. So far, aquatic locomotion studies have minimized refraction in their experimental setups and used the direct linear transform algorithm (DLT) to reconstruct position information, which does not model refraction explicitly. Here we present a refraction corrected ray-tracing algorithm (RCRT) that reconstructs position information using Snell's law.