Insects as Model Animals

Jeremy Niven spends his days at Cambridge University running locusts across ladders and through mazes, trying to figure out how bugs think. Dr. Niven, 34, studies the evolution of brains and neurons in insects and other animals, like humans. We spoke during a break in last month's World Science Festival in New York, where he was a guest presenter, and then again later via telephone. An edited version of the two conversations follows:

Q. YOUR RESEARCH SUBJECTS ARE LOCUSTS. SOME PEOPLE MIGHT SAY, “LOCUSTS, YUCK!” WHY STUDY THEM?

A. I think locusts are sweet. When you get used to them, they are actually quite nice.

Actually, I find that working with invertebrates opens your mind. Insects don’t perceive the world the way we do. Trying to understand them makes you think more about why we see the world as we do. Many animals have different sensors and receive different energies. Birds have ultraviolet vision. So do bees. They can see things we don’t. One learns respect for their capacities.

But the other thing is that insects in general and locusts in particular are admirable because they permit us to gain new information about nervous systems. With insects, we can actually study neural circuits and see how what happens in the neurons relates to behavior.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/13/science/13conv.html?th&emc=th

10000 x smaller than this . dot