On Sun, 07 Sep 2008 05:13:33 GMT, WingedMessenger <Boy@FlyingHigh.com>
wrote:
>"::darkshadows::" <blood@thirsty.net> wrote in
>news:8v76c4pfpipec5e5rq00c1jfeujo4i9doe@4ax.com:
>
>>
>>
>> Why it's so hard to swat a fly
>>
>> Fri Aug 29, 12:50 PM ET
>>
>> CHICAGO (Reuters) - The brains of flies are wired to avoid the
>> swatter, U.S. researchers said on Thursday. ADVERTISEMENT
>>
>>
>>
>> At the mere hint of a threat, the insects adjust their preflight
>> stance to flee in the opposite direction, ensuring a clean getaway,
>> they said in a finding that helps explain why flies so easily evade
>> swipes from their human foes.
>>
>> "These movements are made very rapidly, within about 200 milliseconds,
>> but within that time the animal determines where the threat is coming
>> from and activates an appropriate set of movements to position its
>> legs and wings," Michael Dickinson of the California Institute of
>> Technology said in a statement.
>>
>> "This illustrates how rapidly the fly's brain can process sensory
>> information into an appropriate motor response," said Dickinson, whose
>> research appears in the journal Current Biology.
>>
>> Dickinson's team studied this process in fruit flies using high-speed
>> digital imaging equipment and a fancy fly swatter.
>>
>> In response to a threat from the front, the fly moves its middle legs
>> forward, leans back and raises its back legs for a backward takeoff.
>> If the threat is from the side, the fly leans the other way before
>> takeoff.
>>
>> The findings offer new insight into the fly nervous system, and lends
>> a few clues on how to outsmart a fly.
>>
>> "It is best not to swat at the fly's starting position," Dickinson
>> said. Instead, aim for the escape route.
>>
>> Dickinson, a bioengineer, has devoted his life's work to the study of
>> insect flight. He has built a tiny robotic fly called Robofly and a
>> 3-D visual flight simulator called Fly-O-Vision.
>>
>> (Reporting by Julie Steenhuysen, editing by Will Dunham and Xavier
>> Briand)
>>
>
>You sure read some weird articles LOL.
>
>Mercury.
I see I am not the only one. LOL
Inquring minds want to know.....
darkshadows
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