Welcome back, fellow Jelly-Lovers! We’ve got lots of exciting jellyfish-based updates below, including revealing videos of our very own clytia hemisphaerica, screenshots from and updates about the tracking software, and information on our new recording chamber. (And, of course, I have photos of the full jellyfish costume from the 4th of July!) Jelly Videos: As promised, we […]

Why can’t we Bee friends? Bees (unsurprisingly) don’t do what I want them to Hi everyone, your favorite amateur beekeeper checking in! Since my last post, I’ve moved up to the exciting step of testing on a full hive! The good news is, I’ve gotten over any lingering fear of bees (see my first post). The […]

Hello! There has been some trial and error since my last update. I started my experiment with Monica Gagliano’s protocol (overly simplified!): Grow seedlings, 48 of them: Get them used to 8 hours of light, 16 hours dark (circadian rhythm): Train them under decision covers for 3 days: Test them She had 48 of them. Unfortunately, each of those […]

In my last post I claimed my tunnel was done and ready for testing, but boy was I wrong! I’ve spent the last week or so adding supports, finding a way to cover it to prevent the bees from escaping, covering the surroundings to eliminate landmarks (anything in the environment that lets bees keep track […]

Hello, everyone! Jess here. Lots of exciting things have happened in the last two weeks. First, I have begun to raise a group of silkworms into moths (#mothmom). This involves feeding them Mulberry leaves from my backyard each day, keeping everything extremely clean and crossing my fingers in hopes that I know what I’m doing. […]

Hello all! My name is Anastasiya and I’m a computer engineering and neuroscience double major at the University of Cincinnati. I’m curious about the world around me and my favorite thing to do is learn. My hobbies include making strange noises, fangirling over the fuel efficiency of my car, and volunteering while spreading knowledge to […]

Oh hey there! Long time no see, why don’t you have a seat and hear what I’ve been up to since my last blog update. If you were at the Ann Arbor 4th of July parade you might have seen me dressed up as a beautiful purple octopus (or maybe it was a squid? The […]

DESCRIPTION The dragonfly can capture its prey mid-air with a 95% accuracy rate. What biological equipment does the dragonfly have that allows it to do this amazing feat? To examine this very question, I will be replicating Paloma T. Gonzalez-Bellido’s 2012 PNAS paper using DIY open source tools. Gonzalez-Bellido found that there are neurons that run […]

I built a servo laser set-up (prototype 2) that allows me to control the movement of the laser beam across a curved screen using an X direction servo and a Y direction servo. Below is the final result of prototype 2: The problems: The hot glue on the mirrors makes the mirrors tilt at an angle, and not […]

Hey! What’s up? My name is Trevor Smith, currently a senior at the fabulous Michigan State University, and I am lucky enough to be participating in an internship at Backyard Brains this summer. I am currently working on pheromone detection in moth antennae, specifically how sensitive male moths antennae are to the female pheromone used […]

Hey, it’s the other intern, Marta. I’m the one that has been performing experiments on the circadian rhythm of the cockroaches. It’s like Sleeping Beauty, but with cockroaches! The last time I wrote a blog, I was using the Blaberus Discoidalis, but because the Periplaneta Americana deemed to be the better choice, since “they’re more […]