Collaborative Research: Integrated Analysis of In-Flight Collision Avoidance Systems

该奖项由2009年美国复苏和再投资法案(公法111-5)资助。所有动物都依靠感觉、姿势和环境信息的整合来产生复杂的运动行为，如游泳、打网球或飞行。这个合作项目将研究神经系统如何根据肌肉的生物力学特性以及外部世界通过物理定律对身体施加的机械和环境约束，将感官收集的信息转换为运动命令。研究这些复杂行为方面的一个有利的模型系统是飞行昆虫避免碰撞动作的产生，因为人们对它们的神经系统和昆虫飞行的空气动力学机制了解很多。将在该项目上合作的三个小组分别设在贝勒医学院、莱斯大学和亚利桑那大学，并将分别带来神经生理学、先进计算机建模技术和空气动力学工程方面的互补专业知识。这项工作将提供一个全面的描述飞行中的碰撞避免对视觉威胁的反应，因此将有助于对复杂的感觉-运动转换的基础行为的综合理解。在工作过程中收集的新见解可以应用于各种车辆的实时人工视觉系统和防撞系统的设计。最后，这个项目将通过各种暑期研究项目，让感兴趣的学生获得研究生和本科水平的跨学科实验室经验，从而为研究教育做出贡献。亚利桑那大学参与该项目的学生将学习如何记录动物拍打飞行和人造拍打翅膀的空气动力学参数。

This award is funded under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (Public Law 111-5).All animals rely on the integration of sensory, postural and environmental information to generate complex motor behaviors such as swimming, playing tennis or flying. This collaborative project will study how the nervous system transforms information gathered by the senses into motor commands, based on the biomechanical properties of the muscles as well as the mechanical and environmental constraints imposed on the body by the outside world through the laws of physics. A favorable model system to study these complex aspects of behavior is the generation of collision avoidance maneuvers in flying insects, as much is known about their nervous system and the aerodynamic mechanisms underlying insect flight. The three groups that will collaborate on this project are based at Baylor College of Medicine, Rice University and the University of Arizona and will bring complementary expertise in neurophysiology, advanced computer modeling techniques, and aerodynamic engineering, respectively. This work will provide a comprehensive description of in-flight collision avoidance in response to visual threats and will thus contribute to an integrated understanding of the basis of complex sensory-motor transformations underlying behavior. The new insights that will be gathered over the course of the work could be applied to the design of real-time artificial vision systems and collision avoidance systems for various vehicles. Finally, this project will contribute to research education by allowing interested students to acquire interdisciplinary laboratory experience at the graduate as well as the undergraduate level, through various summer research programs. Students involved in the project at the University of Arizona will learn how to record aerodynamic parameters of flapping flight of animals and manmade flapping wings.