CNS/NB Seminar - Cliff Ragsdale

"Patterning and proprioception in the octopus arm"

The prehensile arms of the octopus are among these animals' most remarkable features, but little is known about the organization of its developmental patterning or about its sensorimotor control mechanisms. First, I will describe our recent observations on sucker pattern formation. Findings from an anomalous clutch suggest that arm length, sucker number, and sucker positioning are independently regulated during embryogenesis. Second, work by Wells and Wells in the middle of last century shown that octopuses can recognize object shapes based on the object's deformation of the sucker rim when grasped. I will present molecular and cellular evidence that a relatively simple sensorimotor map may underlie this sucker proprioception. Finally, I will turn to the long-standing problem of octopus arm proprioception, where we have molecular, cellular and modeling evidence for a novel system of proprioception, one which may provide a new template for motor control in soft robotics.

Host: Markus Meister