International Congress of Odonatology 2017 vision session
The International Congress of Odonatology 2017 (ICO2017) will be held in the Gillespie Centre at Clare College Cambridge from 16 to 20 July 2017.
Registration will be on Saturday 15 July.
Special Session: vision
A special session on dragonfly vision because we are in Cambridge will be held in the Gillespie Centre at Clare College Cambridge
[Chair: TBA]
As dragonfly biologists we are all aware of the phenomenal vision of these animals, and dragonfly vision has been an important area of scientific research for over 50 years now. Findings have been many and often surprising. As well as the intrinsic interest in the system of itself, findings from dragonfly vision have also been important in directing researches into machine vision. Dragonflies have been effective visual predators for over 300My, they must have got something right.
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Richard Rowe: introductory words.
Like many insects adult dragonflies have ocelli, seemingly simple camera eyes. However, the ocelli in Anisoptera are rather elaborate, both in structure and function, suggesting an extreme adaptation to their lifestyle as aerial predators.
Gert Stange: ocelli.
The large compound eyes of dragonflies start from small beginnings. In the adult eye, eye curvature and the organisation of ommatidia relative to the surface generate zones of acute vision and areas more sparsely sampled. These properties explain much of the visual capabilities of dragonflies.
Richard Rowe: Dragonfly vision: what they can do, what do they see?
Simon Laughlin: Why do dragonflies have the longest photoreceptors in the animal kingdom?
Ommatidia detect light through cellular rhabdoms, and the organisation of rhabdoms varies in ommatidia across the eye
Doekele G. Stavenga: Odonate vision and coloration.
Ryo Futahashi: Opsin gene diversity in dragonflies.
and how do they do it?
David O’Carroll: neural processing.
Paloma Gonzalez-Bellido: A deadly game of “tag”: what are TSDNs and do they drive the dragonfly predatory attack?
Jack Supple: Descending sensorimotor control in dragonflies and damselflies.
Presenters:
Ryo Futahashi
Bioproduction Research Institute, National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology (AIST), Tsukuba, Ibaraki 305-8566, Japan
Paloma Gonzalez Bellido
Department of Physiology, Development and Neuroscience, University of Cambridge, Downing Street, Cambridge, UK
Simon Laughlin
Department of Zoology, University of Cambridge, Downing St, Cambridge, UK
David O’Carroll
Department of Biology, Biologi- och Ekologihuset, Sölvegatan 35/37, 223 62 Lund, Sweden
Richard Rowe
Research School of Biology, Australian National University, Canberra, ACT 0200, Australia
Gert Stange
Eccles Institute of Neuroscience, Australian National University, Canberra ACT, Australia
Doekele G. Stavenga
Computational Physics, Zernike Institute for Advanced Materials, University of Groningen, NL-9747 AG Groningen, the Netherlands
Jack Supple
Department of Physiology, Development and Neuroscience, University of Cambridge, Downing Street, Cambridge, UK
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The congress logo is a stylised Anax imperator male to represent Philip Corbet’s pioneering work on seasonal regulation in this species. Philip’s Ph.D research was carried out in the Zoology Department at the University of Cambridge under the supervision of Vincent Wigglesworth, the renowned insect physiologist. Philip was his only ever ecology student.