Playlist
<p>Shakhbout shares with us the story of the first speaking Arabian Oryx "Mozaik" that changed the course of his life and for that matter the future of humankind.</p>
<p>During experiments on the axons of the longfin squid in Woods Hole, we were taken in by the beauty of the fast changing color of the skin. The squid's skin contains many colorful light-reflecting cells called chromatophores. We wanted to try to stimulate the fin nerve directly from our iPod. The results were both interesting and beautiful. The video is a view through an 8x microscope zoomed in on the dorsal side of the squid's fin. We used a suction electrode to stimulate the fin nerve.</p>
<p>Mosaic explores evolution in its natural and artificial forms — the deliberate and random modifications of an organism. As a mixed genre, science-driven anthology film, Mosaic is the first of its kind featuring ten visionary, international filmmakers and stories from the most influential scientists of our time.</p> <p style="text-align:center">________________</p> <p><strong>The Mask Task </strong>- Josephine Decker</p> <p>With documentary audio material and Butoh dance, the multi-age performers are invited to take shapes, organize themselves in nightmare poses and free-form improvisations and create moving tapestries that allow our audience to create its own interpretation of the mysteries of human emotion, stress and fear.</p> <p><strong>Orfeo Nel Canale Alimentare</strong> - Rachel Mayeri</p> <p dir="ltr"><em>In this animated opera, Orpheus attempts to rescue Eurydice from a bout of indigestion by crossing the river of her inner-under world. But in the alimentary canal there are no heroes, only the multitudes.</em></p> <p dir="ltr"><strong>Insān</strong> - Alexis Gambis</p> <p dir="ltr"><em>A young man with a stutter shares with us the story of the first speaking Arabian Oryx "Mozaik" that changed the course of his life and for that matter the future of humankind.</em></p> <p dir="ltr"><strong>Random Legal Move - </strong>Noah Hutton</p> <p dir="ltr"><em>For years Clarice has kept her father’s work hidden, as she works a menial job at the local rec centre. But after a renowned neuroscientist makes her a tempting offer, Clarice must make a decision whether to guard his secret or give the last piece of her father’s genius away.</em></p> <p><strong>Lichen</strong> - Sally Warring</p> <p><em>The journey of the Fungus on its hunt for the perfect Algal mate punctuated by events that occur in the Lichen lifecycle.</em></p> <p><strong>The Fortress</strong> - Miryam Charles</p> <p><em>Four days after being declared dead, a young girl miraculously finds a way to communicate with her mother leading her to find a way to save her. With the help of a mad scientist, she and her husband will embark a journey to Haïti.</em></p> <p><strong>Caroni - </strong>Ian Harnarine</p> <p><em>An immigrant in New York tries to become a Scarlet Ibis (Eudocimus rubber) bird so that she can travel back to the Caribbean for her child’s birthday party.</em></p> <p><strong>Mother, a fairy tale</strong> - Barry J Gibb</p> <p><em>How far would you go to get what you want? In the near future, Jill is a rare survivor in a world nature tore apart, a woman whose powerful maternal urges are thwarted by a scarcity of men. </em></p> <p><strong>Realm of An Inner Child</strong> - Jeannette Louie</p> <p dir="ltr"><em>In a tale about fetal microchimerism, a woman experiences the persistent loss of her child who died in utero many years earlier. Her sadness is eased by the knowledge of their molecular bond as the child's fetal cells were absorbed by her body and a microchimera was created. During a brief interlude, they share a discourse that reveals their enduring physiological attachment.</em></p> <p><strong>The Breeder</strong> - Demelza Kooij</p> <p dir="ltr"><em>Always wanted an extra fluffy rabbit, a dog on two legs, or a legless cat? Dr Schönbacher's new app makes it easy for you to design and order your own!</em><img alt="" src="https://labocine.com/stills/spotlights/theBreeder_720p.jpg" /></p> <p><em>Animation by Maya Edelman</em></p> <p><em>Assistant Editor: Gergo Varga</em></p> <p><em>Labocine Original </em></p> <p><em>Co-produced by Imaginal Disc </em></p>
<p>Dealing with what comes naturally isn’t easy, especially for animals.</p> <p>In Animal Behaviour, the latest animated short from the Oscar®-winning team of Alison Snowden and David Fine (Bob’s Birthday), five animals meet regularly to discuss their inner angst in a group therapy session led by Dr. Clement, a canine psychotherapist.</p>
<p>This animated feature celebrates 17th-century citizen-scientist Antonie van Leeuwenhoek, whose discoveries of microbes changed our view of the biological world.</p> <p>In 1674, Antonie van Leeuwenhoek looked at a drop of lake water through his homemade microscope and discovered an invisible world that no one knew existed. His work inspired countless microbiology researchers, including HHMI investigator Bonnie Bassler, one of the narrators of this animated feature. Leeuwenhoek was a haberdasher and city official in Delft, The Netherlands. He started making simple microscopes and using them to observe the world around him. He was the first to discover bacteria, protists, sperm cells, blood cells, rotifers, and much more. </p>
<p>A series of humoristic animations sewed to the fourteen movements of Saint-Saëns' suite. Each starred by an animal.</p>
<p>Part lyrical document, part farce, Animals Under Anaesthesia: Speculations on the Dreamlife of Beasts explores the imaginary unconscious minds of animals. Images of sex, death, and the natural world are made manifest in the murky and disquieting dreams of a dog, cat, pig and rabbit.</p>
<p>This superhuman dramedy is a live-action hybrid of animation, song and dance. It follows the discoveries of scientist Dr. Sheri Myes, an estranged super hero who aims to revolutionize human consciousness. more at :<br /> <a href="http://thestrangeeyesofdrmyes.com/" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">thestrangeeyesofdrmyes.com/</a></p>
<p>This superhuman dramedy is a live-action hybrid of animation, song and dance. It follows the discoveries of scientist Dr. Sheri Myes, an estranged super hero who aims to revolutionize human consciousness. more at : <a href="http://thestrangeeyesofdrmyes.com/" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">thestrangeeyesofdrmyes.com/</a></p>
<p>This superhuman dramedy is a live-action hybrid of animation, song and dance. It follows the discoveries of scientist Dr. Sheri Myes, an estranged super hero who aims to revolutionize human consciousness. more at :<br /> <a href="http://thestrangeeyesofdrmyes.com/" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">thestrangeeyesofdrmyes.com/</a></p>
<p>This superhuman dramedy is a live-action hybrid of animation, song and dance. It follows the discoveries of scientist Dr. Sheri Myes, an estranged super hero who aims to revolutionize human consciousness. more at :<br /> <a href="http://thestrangeeyesofdrmyes.com/" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">thestrangeeyesofdrmyes.com/</a></p>
<p>This superhuman dramedy is a live-action hybrid of animation, song and dance. It follows the discoveries of scientist Dr. Sheri Myes, an estranged super hero who aims to revolutionize human consciousness. more at :<br /> <a href="http://thestrangeeyesofdrmyes.com/" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">thestrangeeyesofdrmyes.com/</a></p>
<p>This superhuman dramedy is a live-action hybrid of animation, song and dance. It follows the discoveries of scientist Dr. Sheri Myes, an estranged super hero who aims to revolutionize human consciousness. more at :<br /> <a href="http://thestrangeeyesofdrmyes.com/" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">thestrangeeyesofdrmyes.com/</a></p>
<p><strong>Muybridge´s Disobedient Horses</strong> is a series of four episodes in which the artist Anna Vasof investigates where she can find the essence of cinematic illusion when she looks into everyday life and what happens when she uses everyday objects and movements as cinematographic mechanisms. Even if the principle behind the illusion has been around for many years and is taken for granted, each of Vasof´s episodes produces its own unique cinematic illusion. Each episode shows together with the animated story of how the illusion has been made. Unlike a magician, the secret behind the "magic trick" in her experiments is revealed, thereby making the cinematic illusions even more magical. <br /> In the first episode with the title "Self-Portrait", she demonstrates an object made out of simple everyday objects such as a metal bucket, an ordinary lamp, magnifiers, rope and paper coffee cups. When she pulls the rope the lamp starts pending and the object transforms into an audiovisual instrument, which projects a frustrated figure who looks like the artist and starts hitting her head on the wall of the projection. A similar story takes place in the third episode with the title "The book of falling words 2," Vasof demonstrates a flip-book which shows the footage of a real book in which the words of different meaningful chapters are falling down. <br /> When everyday life is used as a cinematographic mechanism the making off takes the new role. When the making off comes either into a direct dialogue or into conflict with the narrative of the illusion new meaning is created. <strong>Muybridge´s Disobedient Horses</strong> is a film which suggests a new method to tell stories with social and personal conflicts. <em>(production notes)</em>)</p>
<p>Racoon, fox and bear are watching wildlife documentaries in their suburban flat. Soon the fox starts acting quite weirdly.</p>
<p>In the video, “How to Act like an Animal,” workshop participants in Los Angeles reenact a clip from a wildlife documentary. The clip depicts chimpanzees hunting a red colobus monkey and then eating the meat. The clip is excerpted from the 1995 National Geographic documentary <em>The New Chimpanzees </em>that was shot at Jane Goodall’s research site in Gombe, Tanzania, and features the community she researched for over thirty years.</p> <p>In the video, the documentary sequence plays through three times on one channel, while the performers are seen acting in real time in relation to the footage on a second channel. The first loop shows the workshop actors watching the monitor showing the clip. The second time through, the actors have been directed to simply “act like the chimpanzees.” In the third instance, actors are assigned roles of individual chimps, and the video is edited shot by shot.</p> <p>Credits: Directed by Rachel Mayeri</p> <p>Actors: Dave Johnson, Estela Garcia, Penny Folger, Adam Overton, Diane Lefer, Joe Seeley</p> <p>The "How to Act like an Animal" workshops have taken place in England and Switzerland.</p> <p> </p>
<p>Human-marine animal interaction programs have been around for some time. But In recent years, there has been increasing controversy over the impact of these interactions on both the marine animals and their environments. Where do we draw the line? With meeting human needs on one side - and the possible exploitation of our marine animal ecosystem on the other? The answers to these questions are just beginning to emerge. And they are likely to be imperfect and equivocal.</p>
<p>A stop-motion spoof that targets the foibles of creatures of all kinds, this animation reverses the usual hierarchy of the animal kingdom with very memorable and hilarious results.</p>
<p>Stories unravel to "Trade Song" by the Métis Fiddler Quartet in this experimental stop motion animation directed and animated by Elizabeth LaPensée and edited by Sky Hopinka.</p>
<p>Presenting jazz bopping Mushrooms and belly-dancing Basidium! Spectacular Science is a collaborative project which aims to provide a wide audience with access to scientific knowledge and support the education of students in science subjects. The animation is inspired by 1920′s animation such as the Silly Symphonies series and other early Walt Disney shorts.</p>
<p>Two fictional species try to make it through the day in this bleak, animated parody of the natural world.</p>
<p>Project Nim is a 2011 British documentary film. It focuses on Project Nim, a research project that was mounted in the 1970s to determine whether a primate raised in close contact with humans could develop a limited "language" based on American Sign Language.[1] The project was centred on a chimpanzee named Nim Chimpsky.</p>
<p>Rearing Anartia is an 8mm film documenting the work of lepidopterists Bob Silberglied and Annette Aiello at the Barro Colorado Island field station in Panama in 1976. Silberglied's untimely death in a plane crash at age 35 left behind an undiscovered body of work, including two research movies. Forty years later, we digitized these two films held in the Smithsonian Institution's archives and added a musical score. "Rearing Anartia" is an early testimony of how two creative scientists intended to communicate their passion for the study of nature to broad audiences.</p> <p>"Rearing Anartia Butterflies," by Silberglied and Annette Aiello, 1976. 8 mm film<br /> Music by Kristina Dutton & Lisa Schonberg<br /> Original footage held at the Smithsonian Institution Archives<br /> Digitization sponsored by Dr. Arnaud Martin (The George Washington University, Washington DC), and the National Science Foundation</p>
<p>Pupal development of a Buckeye butterfly (Junonia coenia). The movie was taken by Aaron Pomerantz and Damien Gailly. Pupae of "blue" Buckeye provided by Rachel Thayer. During the larval stage, one of the forewing disks was surgically removed using a procedure developed by Julian Kimura and Ryan Null during the Marine Biological Laboratory Embryology Course. This results in a pupa that is missing not just the forewing, but also the region of the pupal case that would be covering the forewing. This leave the hindwing exposed. This time-lapse, which spans 8 days, begins just as the pupa forms and ends just as the adult butterfly is prepared to emerge. During that period, you can see the tracheal system form in the hindwing, scales grow, and both structural and pigment colors appear. The original posting of this video was 1 minute 34 seconds, but this one is speeded up to just 20 seconds.</p>
<p>The earth dwelling nematode worm <em>C. elegans</em> is model organism used by scientists to study the connections between neurons and behaviors. Their 302 neurons are readily seen through their transparent body. The little worm have very sharp sensations such as smelling odors that can’t be sensed by human, or temperature changes less than 0.1 degree. </p> <p>Scene 1 shows realtime speed of an adult <em>C. elegans</em> crawling on a phase contrast microscope with <a href="http://instagram.com/iLabCam">@iLabCam</a>.</p> <p>Scene 2 shows groups of <em>C. elegans</em> in different stage of their life in time lapse movie under a dissecting microscope with <a href="http://www.iduoptics.com">LabCam</a>.</p> <p>Scene 3 shows a transgenic <em>C. elegans</em> under fluorescent microscope with <a href="http://www.iduoptics.com">LabCam</a>.</p>
<p>Primate Cinema: Apes as Family is a drama made expressly for chimpanzees – and the chimps' reaction to its screening at the Edinburgh Zoo. Chimpanzees watch television as a form of enrichment in captivity. But no filmmaker had made a film for a specifically ape audience. Commissioned by Arts Catalyst, and supported with an art-science grant from the Wellcome Trust, the director, in consultation with primatologists, researched chimpanzees' reactions to a variety of television genres – Teletubbies, wildlife films, human actors playing chimp behavior, kettle drums, chimpanzee display behavior. Chimps seem to like to watch the same things as human primates – dramas around food, territory, social status, and sex. In Apes as Family, the protagonist is a young female chimp, played by a human in an animatronic costume, whose facial expressions are controlled by puppeteers. The young female, like Dorothy in the Wizard of Oz, encounters strange males on an adventure, which eventually leads back "home." The drama is intercut with the chimps’ responses to the film, when it premiered at the zoo. Chimps' were attentive to the film; some sat and watched, others attempted to touch or smell the characters, and other appeared to mimic the action on screen. The project was intended to create a prism for human beings to think about the inner world of chimpanzees. By watching a movie through chimps’ eyes, we can imagine what they think and feel. Chimps are, after all, our closest relatives. Known for their complex social, cognitive and emotional lives, they also share with us a fascination with cinema.</p> <p>Commissioned by Arts Catalyst with support from The Wellcome Trust</p> <p>Rachel Mayeri, Director and Writer | Matt Johnstone, Producer | PJ Raval, Director of Photography | Augie Robles, Editor | Dr. Sarah-Jane Vick, Consulting Primatologist</p> <p><strong>Cast:</strong></p> <p>Denise Pearlman, Lead Female Chimp, Dave Nelson, Puppeteer, Norman Tempia, Puppeteer, J.C. Lee, Lead Male Chimp, Song Man Choh, Male Chimp, Heather Sultz, Female Chimp, Dawn Meyer, Female Chimp, Lex Quarterman, Juvenile Male, Angelina Prendergast, Female Chimp</p>
<p>Nico shows us the sequential stages for staining and image mouse embryos in Marc Tessier-Lavigne's Laboratory of Brain Development and Repair</p> <p><strong>Nico</strong> is from Paris, France. He received a B.S. is Cell Biology (2006) from the École Normale Superieure de la rue d'Ulm and a M.S. in Neuroscience (2007) from the Université Pierre et Marie Curie. He performed his Ph.D. work on axon guidance with Dr. Alain Chédotal at the Vision Institute in Paris before joining our laboratory. His interest lies in understanding how commissural axons in the spinal cord navigate to and across one of their intermediate targets at the spinal cord midline.</p>
<p dir="ltr">e12.5 mouse embryo nervous system. 12.5 days after fertilization of the fertilization, the mouse embryo is about 1cm head to tail and about ⅔ through gestation. At this point the motor nerves (yellow), which will connect the brain (the spinal cord) to every muscle, are send their axons out to find the developing muscles. The sensory nerves (pink) are projecting from the dorsal root ganglia (flanking the length of the spinal cord on both sides) are sending axons out to the body as well. The distal tips of nerves can be seen in blue. All of this is visualized by dissolving fats, which scatter light, and matching the refractive index of the sample with organic solvents (an old technique) which makes the embryo appear virtually transparent. Then laser light sheet microscopy (a new technique) is used to image the entire embryo at very high resolution.</p> <p dir="ltr"><strong>Soundtrack: Time, Pink Floyd</strong></p>
<p dir="ltr">13.5 days after fertilization of the egg, the mouse embryo is about 1cm head to tail, and about ⅔ done with gestation. At this point the motor nerves (green), which will connect the brain (the spinal cord) to every muscle, are send their axons out to find the developing muscles. The sensory nerves (red) are projecting from the dorsal root ganglia (flanking the length of the spinal cord on both sides) are sending axons out to the body as well. All of this is visualized by dissolving fats, which scatter light, and matching the refractive index of the sample with organic solvents (an old technique) which makes the embryo appear virtually transparent. Then laser light sheet microscopy (a new technique) is used to image the entire embryo at very high resolution.</p> <p dir="ltr"><strong>Soundtrack - Ashes to Ashes, David Bowie</strong></p>
<p>J.Ralph & Antony Hegarty (of Antony & The Johnsons) composed Manta Ray, a powerful song for the soundtrack of the documentary film « Racing Extinction ». We created the video to go with the music. According to the artists, the writing of the song was largely inspired by plankton images from our video for TED «<a href="http://ed.ted.com/lessons/the-secret-life-of-plankton"> Secret life of Plankton</a> ». The video got major exposure when the documentary film and soundtrack were launched internationally.</p> <p>Director/Editor : Noé Sardet</p> <p>Producer : J. Ralph</p> <p>Footage from "The Secret life of Plankton" copyright Ted Education/Parafilms. Executive Producer : Tierney Thys</p> <p>Images : Christian Sardet, Sharif Mirshak & Noé Sardet Copyright CNRS/Plankton Chronicles </p> <p><a href="http://www.planktonchronicles.org/" target="_blank">www.planktonchronicles.org</a></p> <p>Music by J. Ralph & Anohni (F.K.A. Antony)</p> <p>1 Million views on <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f1JiJhWkM9M">youtube </a>in just a few days! The song is nominated in the category “Best original Song” at the <a href="http://oscar.go.com/news/winners/oscar-winners-2016-see-the-complete-list">2016 Oscars</a>!</p> <p><a href="https://genius.com/J-ralph-and-antony-manta-ray-lyrics">Lyrics</a></p>
<p>We live today in a globalized world, and although we are aware of where a product is from, we don't know where it has been. Due to the low cost of shipping it pays to outsource production to wherever in the world production is cheaper. Shipping emits globally twice as much CO2 as aviation, but CO2 emissions from shipping are not regulated by the Kyoto Protocol or the European legislation. This movie is based on a fish sticks trip.</p>
<p>This groundbreaking concert film captures the final night of Bjork's multi-year Biophilia tour as performance, video, and live instrumentation - digital, traditional, or completely unclassifiable - combine in a audiovisual experience like no other.</p>
<p>Originally screened in the UK last summer on Channel 4, ‘When Björk Met Attenborough’ follows Björk and Attenborough as they investigate and discuss the connection which exists between music and nature. Narrated by Tilda Swinton and inspired by Björk’s technological project Biophilia, which Attenborough provided a spoken introduction for, the film is a unique encounter between two of the most iconic thinkers of our time.</p>
<p>A genetic algorithm evolves a single neural network which controls the behavior of each polyp in the coral. An attempt to work with the beauty of emergence and complexity. </p>
<p>When a wide-eyed 10-year-old girl visits her fathers insect laboratory, she receives an unorthodox education in genetics.</p>
<p>Blank reproduces the sterile conditions of a genetic laboratory of molecular medicine. The room, the bodies and cells of the animals are subject to the strictest controls; everything has been created specially.</p> <p>In the film you will pass through a six-minute animal behavoir experimental setup and participate on different levels. This experimental short-film reconstructs from an artistic perspective an experiment in which mice with Alzheimer’s disease fail – even after repeated training – to remember where the island is concealed under the surface of the white water in a white tub. They are used to test whether new substances can repair the defects in the brain.</p>
<p>Listen to the hippocampal neurons of rat as it dreams and awakes from its deepest thoughts. As it comes out of its dream state, the rats 'place cells' are active in distinct locations (place fields) while a rat runs along a track.</p> <p>These place cells were first discovered in the brain, and specifically in the hippocampus, by O'Keefe and Dostrovsky (1971). Though the hippocampus plays a role in learning and memory, the existence of place cells within the hippocampus demonstrates the role it plays with spatial adaptation and awareness.</p>
<p>Mouse Embryo, 14 days old, showing the sensory nerves (in red) and the motor nerves (in white).</p> <p>Credit: Nicolas Renier, The Rockefeller University</p> <p> </p>
<p>Developing embryos of the African clawed frog, Xenopus laevis. For Froglapse2F, the embryos start out at a variety of stages and the movie covers approximately 36 hrs of development. For Froglapse3, all the embryos start out at the two-cell stage and the movie covers approximately 48 hrs at which time the embryos begin to hatch from the eggs. Xenopus laevis is widely used in biomedical research and many important discoveries regarding the mechanisms and molecules that control animal development were made using Xenopus.</p>
<p>Adrenergic and Dopaminergic systems of the mouse embryo and adult mouse brain.</p> <p>Credit: Nicolas Renier, The Rockefeller University</p>
<p>Developing embryos of the African clawed frog, Xenopus laevis. For Froglapse2F, the embryos start out at a variety of stages and the movie covers approximately 36 hrs of development. For Froglapse3, all the embryos start out at the two-cell stage and the movie covers approximately 48 hrs at which time the embryos begin to hatch from the eggs. Xenopus laevis is widely used in biomedical research and many important discoveries regarding the mechanisms and molecules that control animal development were made using Xenopus.</p>
<p>Developing embryos of the African clawed frog, Xenopus laevis. For Froglapse2F, the embryos start out at a variety of stages and the movie covers approximately 36 hrs of development. For Froglapse3, all the embryos start out at the two-cell stage and the movie covers approximately 48 hrs at which time the embryos begin to hatch from the eggs. Xenopus laevis is widely used in biomedical research and many important discoveries regarding the mechanisms and molecules that control animal development were made using Xenopus.</p>
<p>A series of close-ups of a bluebottle fly juggling various objects with its legs while on the tip of match.</p>
<p>Examines the sea horse, the only fish that swims upright. We watch it use its prehensile tail to wrap around plants and other sea horses. A frontal bulge houses organs including an air ballast. Three fins propel this fish. We see a female place her eggs in a male's pouch where they are fertilized and nurtured until birth in violent contractions. Inside the pouch are nurturing blood vessels. We then follow the growth of an embryo, greatly magnified: we examine its heart beating and its dorsal fin moving. Young sea horses attach themselves to each other. The film ends with images of many sea horses moving on the ocean floor, superimposed on a horse race.</p>
<p>I have been interested in the cumulative paths of insects like fruit flies and have been developing a methods for visualizing all the routs taken. In the instances where I have done this I am amazed to find how much of the surface the flies cover. Dotted lines are the flights of the flies. The big black blobs are a house fly passing through the scene. The dark and jagged lines are the fruit flies walking.</p>
<p>Fruit fly <em>Drosophila melanogaster</em> mating inside a experimental chamber designed to track the detail of their behavior. Fruit fly sing and dance to the female to win her heart over before they mate.</p>
<p>(<strong>left</strong>) An <em>Drosophila</em> flies inside the cylindrical ‘FlyCave’ VR arena. Its’ position is tracked and highlighted in red. (<strong>right</strong>). The virtual world simulated consists of a cyan sphere and a magenta pyramid in a naturalistic environment. As the fly explores the arena the virtual world is updated in real-time to maintain a perspective correct display for the subject.</p> <p><a href="https://strawlab.org/">The Lab of Andrew Straw </a>studies neural circuits and behaviour at the University of Freiburg, Germany. By developing advanced technical systems such as virtual reality arenas, they investigate the mechanistic basis of visual behaviours such as navigation in <em>Drosophila</em>.</p> <p><a href="https://strawlab.org/freemovr">https://strawlab.org/freemovr</a></p>
<p>A journey with two scientists at <a href="http://www.kyoto-u.ac.jp/en">Kyoto University</a> : from the botanical gardens to flies with spotted wings to green fluorescent larvae. </p> <p>Shigeyuki and his postdoctoral student Kenji venture through the <a href="http://www.sci.kyoto-u.ac.jp/en/divisions/facilities/botanical/">Botanical Gardens at </a><a href="http://www.kyoto-u.ac.jp/en">Kyoto University</a> to collect novel <em>Drosophila</em> strains. They bring them back to the lab and observe various strains, especially <em>Drosophila guttifera</em> under the microscope.</p> <p><a href="http://www.kyoto-u.ac.jp/en/about/profile/faculty/centers/hakubi.html">The Hakubi Center for Advanced Studies and Graduate School of Science</a>, <a href="http://www.kyoto-u.ac.jp/en">Kyoto University</a></p>
<p>(<strong>left</strong>) A <em>Drosophila</em> flies in the ‘FlyCave’ VR arena (position highlighted in red). As the fly flies, the virtual world is modified; rotated about its center, eliciting the optomotor response in the subject and causing it to turn. Doing this continuously causes the fly to follow a path of our design, an infinity-symbol (∞) shaped path (<strong>right</strong>).</p>
<p><strong>(left</strong>) A flying <em>Drosophila</em> (position highlighted in red) interacts with a virtual vertical gray post. (<strong>right</strong>) The virtual world being simulated. On the arena walls a checkerboard texture is moved vertically to control the fly’s altitude and to prevent it flying into the walls.</p> <p><a href="https://strawlab.org/">The Lab of Andrew Straw </a>studies neural circuits and behavior at the University of Freiburg, Germany. By developing advanced technical systems such as virtual reality arenas, they investigate the mechanistic basis of visual behaviors such as navigation in <em>Drosophila</em>.</p> <p><a href="https://strawlab.org/freemovr">https://strawlab.org/freemovr</a></p>
<p>Fig is different from other fruit flies, though he won’t know until metamorphosis. This is his story.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:18px"><span style="font-family:arial">Geneticist in a laboratory.</span></span></p>