. Earth Science News .
Rat Like Senses A Whisker Away From Humans

Dr Tony Prescott said: "If you are exploring a surface with your hand you will control the position of your fingertips so as to get as much information as possible from each touch. We are discovering that rats do something very similar with their whiskers. That is, they adjust the movements of their whiskers on a moment-by-moment basis using information from each contact to decide how best to position their whiskers for the next one."
by Staff Writers
Western Bank, UK (SPX) Feb 21, 2007
The sophisticated way in which rats use their whiskers in their surrounding environments show significant parallels with how humans use their fingertips, according to new research carried out at the University of Sheffield. Rats are tactile animals that use their facial whiskers as their primary sense. These whiskers are swept back and forth, or `whisked� many times each second.

Research carried out by Dr Tony Prescott and colleagues from the University�s Department of Psychology found that these whisker movements are actively controlled like human fingertips.

They found that whiskers near a point of contact subsequently move less, while those away from it move more. This active control of whiskers, allows a rat to `home-in� on interesting objects in their environment, while ensuring that their whiskers touch gently against objects rather than bending strongly against them.

Until now, the understanding of what guides whisker movements during natural behaviour was limited, largely due to the difficulty of accurately observing whisker positions in freely moving animals. The researchers, however, used high-speed video and recordings of muscle activity to study how `whisking� behaviour in rats changes upon contact with an object.

Dr Tony Prescott said: "If you are exploring a surface with your hand you will control the position of your fingertips so as to get as much information as possible from each touch. We are discovering that rats do something very similar with their whiskers. That is, they adjust the movements of their whiskers on a moment-by-moment basis using information from each contact to decide how best to position their whiskers for the next one."

The researchers are currently working with Bristol Robotics Laboratory to build a robot with an artificial whisker sense in order to better understand rat whisking behaviour and to develop artificial touch systems that may be useful for robots.

Email This Article

Related Links
Sheffield
Darwin Today At TerraDaily.com

Antarctic Warming To Reduce Animals At Base Of Ecosystem As Penguin Shift South
Columbus OH (SPX) Feb 20, 2007
The warming most global climate models predict will do more harm than simply raise the sea levels that most observers fear. It will make drastic changes in fragile ecosystems throughout the world, especially in the Antarctic. A warming trend during the last few decades in the Antarctic Peninsula has already forced penguin populations to migrate south and perhaps diminished the abundance of krill that are at the base of the massive food chain at the bottom of the world.







  • Indonesia To Use Concrete Balls To Plug "Mud Volcano"
  • Keeping The Phones Ringing During Disaster Relief In Mozambique
  • Chicago Exchange To Launch Hurricane Futures
  • Indonesia To Relocate Key Railway Threatened By Mud Volcano

  • Russia, Kyoto Protocol And Climate Change
  • In Chilly Washington Global Warming Gets New Airing
  • Blair Wants New Climate Change Deal Before Exit
  • US Offered Lucrative Lure Of Global Carbon Trading

  • 3D Upstart Eyes Google Earth With Helicopter
  • ESA Celebrates 15 Years Of Near-Real Time Data Delivery In Earth Observation
  • Gascom To Launch 4 Smotr Low-Orbit Remote Sensing Satellites
  • GeoEye Makes Final Debt Payment For The Purchase Of Space Imaging

  • Scientists Convert Heat To Power Using Organic Molecules
  • Wild Grass Could Hold Key To Clean Fuels Of The Future
  • For US Global Warming Is Now Hot
  • Australia To Clip Greenhouse Gas Emmissions With Phase Out Of Inefficient Lighting

  • Scientists On The Way To Sifting Out A Cure For HIV
  • End The Black AIDS Plague
  • British Company In Bird Flu Outbreak May Cut Jobs
  • Large-Scale Trial Of HIV Vaccine Launched In South Africa

  • Rat Like Senses A Whisker Away From Humans
  • Antarctic Warming To Reduce Animals At Base Of Ecosystem As Penguin Shift South
  • Researchers Untangle Nature Of Regressive Evolution In Cavefish
  • World Shark Attacks Rise Slightly But Continue Long-Term Dip

  • Sand Latest Irritant In Singapore Regional Ties
  • Ivory Coast Toxic Dump Victims Upset Over Pay Deal
  • EasyJet Chief Says Business Travellers Have Role In Saving Environment
  • Britain Launches Investigation Into Monsanto Toxic Waste

  • Neuroscientists Explain Inner Workings Of Critical Pain Pathway
  • Human Ecological Footprint In 2015 And Amazonia Revealed
  • Risk Of Extinction Accelerated Due To Interacting Human Threats
  • Carnegie Mellon Student Develops Mood-Sharing Gadget To Help Computer Users Express Their Feelings

  • The content herein, unless otherwise known to be public domain, are Copyright 1995-2006 - SpaceDaily.AFP and UPI Wire Stories are copyright Agence France-Presse and United Press International. ESA PortalReports are copyright European Space Agency. All NASA sourced material is public domain. Additionalcopyrights may apply in whole or part to other bona fide parties. Advertising does not imply endorsement,agreement or approval of any opinions, statements or information provided by SpaceDaily on any Web page published or hosted by SpaceDaily. Privacy Statement