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SCIENTIFIC DISCOVERIES ON MOTHS. Moths in robotics. Normally moths are afraid of humans. The moths' appearance as aged and dirty butterflies turns them into undesirable insects that scare, and damage our clothes and food. But these insects that apparenly are so insignificant and disposable have an amazing power in their small brain (not bigger than a rice grain). This power of theirs was discovered in the University of Arizona by an engineer called Charles Higgins, who realized a public demonstration immobilizing a moth inside a plastic pipe, after having placed it on a robot of approximately 15 cm. high; a wheeled-machine was left in front of this robot. The public's surprise was to see that the robot began to move stimulated by the moth's brain; including the wheeled table was moving towards the edges each time had problems on its way.
Recent investigations on moths discovered their mental power. This demonstration managed to connect an electrode with a moth brain neuron, that is in charge with focusing its vision during the insect flight. The object managed to move through a mathematical formula translated by a computer, which allowed to codify the brain signals. This discovery is very important for science and medicine. This could serve in a future to allow handicapped pleople with amputated extremeties move their prothesis with only some signals of their brain. Moths in light phenomena. It is known by phototaxis the phenomenon by which several alive organisms react to light. There are insects that have negatives response, like the cockroaches, when the light is on they hide; but the moths are insects that feel totally attracted to light, in general. The natural thing would be that an insect rejects the light, but the moths show positive phototaxis. This is a phenomenon that sometimes produces death when getting in touch with a heat source. That is why is so used in electronic devices for killing insects, where the positive phototaxic reaction of the moths is used for plague control.
Moths keep their direction during their migrations by moonlight. If you want to read our other articles about cockroaches, moths and snails traps as well as some curiosities about these insects,
click below.
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