LIFESCI 2D03 Chapter Notes - Chapter 7: Olfaction
29 Jan 2014
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Document Summary
Catfish track the wake of their prey: mechanoreceptors: sensory sensitive to changes in pressure, lateral line system: in fish, mechanoreceptors that provide hydrodynamic information, chemoreception: the process by which an animal detects chemical stimuli, olfaction: the detection of airborne chemical stimuli, gustation: the detection of dissolved chemicals, often within the mouth, some fish, such as minnows, have well developed chemoreception systems that allow them to recognize conspecific predation events and then respond accordingly with antipredator behaviours. The research team used guppies as prey fish because they create a swimming wake that has been well described: pohlmann"s team aimed to determine whether catfish could use cues provided only from the wake of individual fish to stalk and attack their prey, the researchers designed an infrared video system to track the movement path of both the predator and the prey in an environment of complete darkness, they used four catfish and observed each one stalking up to ten individual guppies.
