Memory of the Solar Ephemeris in Honey Bees

动物行为程序非技术摘要建议#：9816691 PI：William F.Towne标题：Ri：蜜蜂的日历表许多动物，包括蜜蜂，都会记住太阳运动的时间进程，以用于它们的定位，关于它们如何做到这一点，还有很多需要学习的地方。根据首席研究员最近的研究结果，蜜蜂在生命早期似乎只记住一次太阳的轨迹；如果它们被动地从出生地点转移到另一个类似的地点，它们就不会重新学习太阳相对于新风景的路线。在这个项目中，这项研究将确定蜜蜂是否能够重新学习太阳的运动，如果是的话，在什么特定的生物相关环境下。此外，对流离失所的蜜蜂进行的进一步实验将探索蜜蜂学习太阳进程的认知结构，例如，显示蜜蜂对太阳进程的记忆是否与它们对风景的记忆密不可分，或者这两种记忆是否是不可分割的。蜜蜂一直是行为生物学中的重要模式生物。本物种在感觉生物学及其交流、定向和学习机制方面被很好地理解。因此，这个项目的结果将加深我们对小型大脑如何获得和编码复杂的外部关系的理解。

Animal Behavior ProgramNontechnical AbstractProposal #: 9816691PI: William F. Towne Title: RUI: Memory of the Solar Ephemeris in Honey BeesMany animals, including honey bees, memorize the time course of the sun's movements for use in their orientation, and there is much to learn about how they do this. According to the principal investigator's recent results, honey bees seem to memorize the sun's course only once early in life; they do not re-learn the sun's course relative to a new landscape if they are passively displaced from their natal site to another, similar site. In this project, the research will determine whether or not bees can ever re-learn the sun's movements and, if so, under what particular, biologically relevant circumstances. In addition, further experiments with displaced bees will explore the cognitive structures underlying the bees' learning of the sun's course, showing, for example, whether the bees' memory of the sun's course is inextricably linked to their memory of the landscape, or whether the two memories are separable. Honey bees have been important model organisms in behavioral biology. This species is well understood with respect to sensory biology and their mechanisms of communication, orientation, and learning. The results of this project will therefore deepen our understanding of how complex external relationships are acquired and encoded by small brains in general.