3-D vision discovered in praying mantis

Date:  February 8, 2018

Source:  Newcastle University

Summary:

Miniature glasses have revealed a new form of 3-D vision in praying mantises that could lead to simpler visual processing for robots.

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Supreme Insect! Praying Mantis Named After Ruth Bader Ginsburg

By Tia Ghose, Senior Writer | June 3, 2016 08:50am ET

A new praying mantis has been identified, and like Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, it has a fondness for prominent neckwear.

The new leaf-dwelling species was discovered in the wilds of Madagascar and named Ilomantis ginsburgae, after Supreme Court Associate Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg. I. ginsburgae is the first species to be defined and classified based on its female genitalia. Historically, biologists relied on male genitalia to classify and identify species.

"This species description of Ilomantis ginsburgae is novel since it relied heavily on the features of the female genitalia," lead author Sydney Brannoch, a Case Western Reserve University doctoral candidate, said in a statement. "As a feminist biologist, I often questioned why female specimens weren't used to diagnose most species. This research establishes the validity of using female specimens in the classification of praying mantises."

The creature in question was first discovered in Madagascar in 1967, but the specimen has been housed at the French National Museum of Natural History in Paris ever since. Only recently was it closely studied and identified. Like other praying mantises,I. ginsburgae has a green flattened body, huge bug eyes and veiny wings that resemble leaves. Like other mantises, the newly designated species has prominent neck plates that somewhat resemble the frilly collars, called jabots, that Justice Ginsburg is so fond of wearing.

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Mantis at the Movies: Tiny Specs Reveal Bugs' 3D Vision

by Stephanie Pappas, Live Science Contributor | January 11, 2016 04:04pm ET

By fitting praying mantises with teeny, tiny glasses, scientists have proved that these insects have 3D vision.

"Despite their minute brains, mantises are sophisticated visual hunters which can capture prey with terrifying efficiency. We can learn a lot by studying how they perceive the world," study researcher Jenny Read, a professor of vision science at Newcastle University in the United Kingdom, said in a statement.

To determine whether insects use 3D vision to hunt, Read and her colleagues had to come up with a way to show mantises both two- and three-dimensional images. So the researchers invented mantis 3D movies.

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First praying mantis survey of Rwanda uncovers rich diversity

Study documents increased species numbers, outlines need for biological surveys

Date: December 17, 2015

Source: Cleveland Museum of Natural History

A college student working at The Cleveland Museum of Natural History was lead author on the first formal survey of praying mantises in Rwanda, which revealed a 155 percent increase in praying mantis species diversity for the African country. Riley Tedrow, a Case Western Reserve University graduate student pursuing field research for the Museum, participated in two surveys across four locations in Rwanda, including three national parks. The survey was published Oct. 1, 2015 in the journal Zootaxa.

Tedrow helped conduct fieldwork in 2013 and 2014 with collaborators at Rwanda's Kitabi College of Conservation and Environmental Management. The team collected 739 insects representing 41 species from Akagera National Park, Nyungwe National Park, Volcanoes National Park and the Arboretum de Ruhande at the National University of Rwanda. Collection methods included sweep netting and light trapping to gather grass, bark, flower and lichen mantises.

The survey added 28 new praying mantis species records to Rwanda. These add to the 18 previously recorded praying mantis species for the country. In addition, 20 new praying mantis species were recorded for the region, including neighboring Uganda and Burundi. The study has increased scientists' knowledge of the praying mantis species present in Rwanda by 155 percent. Tedrow discovered and described one new species of praying mantis, Dystacta tigrifrutex (meaning "bush tiger mantis"), in 2014 from the insects collected. Research continues on the specimens already inventoried.

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19 New Swift & Clever Praying Mantises Discovered

By Stephanie Pappas, Senior Writer | March 18, 2014 01:19pm ET

Swift, deadly hunters lurk in the trees, many camouflaged to look like lichen or bark. They don't sit and wait for prey; they actively pursue it. And when danger threatens, some even leap to the forest floor, fluttering to the ground like so many dead leaves.

That's the life of 19 new praying mantis species discovered in Central and South America. The findings, announced today (March 18) in the journal ZooKeys, suggest the world of praying mantis diversity is largely mysterious.

"Based on this study, we can predict that mantis groups with similar habitat specialization in Africa, Asia and Australia will also be far more diverse than what is currently known," study researcher Gavin Svenson, an invertebrate zoologist at The Cleveland Museum of Natural History, said in a statement.

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For Males Dying to Mate, Only Certain Females Will Do

For some spiders and the praying mantis, mating is a deadly game, with the pipsqueak males often sacrificing themselves in the name of sex. How a male decides which leggy lady is worth his life, and how the female decides whether to scarf him down, is complicated, two new studies show.

This Russian roulette mating strategy is called "sexual cannibalism." The females in species that practice sexual cannibalism sometimes eat their male partners after, or even during, sex. The drivers of this unusual phenomenon are still up in the air, though new research is shedding light on the dynamics between male and female that may leave one of them dead.

Males, it seems, weigh multiple factors when approaching a potential mate.

"You can see it in the approach behavior of the male," said William Brown, an associate professor at the State University of New York in Fredonia and lead researcher on a study about sexual cannibalism in the praying mantis. "There's this conflict between mating and surviving. He's taking this slow, cautious approach, because she is a huge threat to his future offspring."

Continued:  http://www.livescience.com/19907-sexually-cannibalistic-mate-choice.html

Spider cannibalism

Male Spiders Let Mates Eat Them for Kids' Sake

The unkind act of butchering and eating your mate after sex, typified by the female black-widow spider and praying mantis, may make for healthier babies, new research suggests.

The researchers found that a male orb-web spider makes the ultimate evolutionary sacrifice: giving his life for the health of his offspring.

Sexual cannibalism is the act of one partner eating the other after sex. In the orb-web spider Argiope bruennichi, the female tries to grab and wrap up the male at the onset of mating so she can snack on him during sex. In the lab, only about 30 percent of the males survive their first mating, but by letting the female gnaw on them, the males prolong the sex act, making it more likely they will inseminate their partner.

Of these survivors, half go on to find a second mate, while the others try again for the same female. Due to the male's anatomy, two copulations is the limit. (When you are facing a life without sex, is it really worth it to go on?)

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