60. Rickesh Patel: Mantis Shrimp navigation, walking bumblebees, and scientific illustrations

Jul 3, 2022

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Ricky Patel is a postdoc at Lund University, where he studies the neural basis of navigation behaviours in arthropods. In this conversation, we talk about his work on spatial navigation in Mantis Shrimp and bumblebees, the difficulty of recording from moving insects, science communication, and scientific illustrations.

BJKS Podcast is a podcast about neuroscience, psychology, and anything vaguely related, hosted by Benjamin James Kuper-Smith. In 2022, episodes will appear irregularly, roughly twice per month. You can find the podcast on all podcasting platforms (e.g., Spotify, Apple/Google Podcasts, etc.).

Timestamps
00:04: What is a Mantis Shrimp?
09:53: How Ricky started studying Mantis Shrimp navigation
16:00: Start discussing Ricky's 2020 Current Biology paper on path integration in Mantis Shrimp
25:03: A hierarchy of compass cues
34:10: Start discussing Ricky's 2020 Proceedings B paper on landmark navigation in Mantis Shrimp
38:11: Complex behaviour doesn't require a large brain
40:16: Start discussing Ricky's 2022 Current Biology paper about path integration in walking bumblebees
46:14: How well can we record neural activity from moving insects?
49:54: Twitter in academia
53:51: Rickesh's work as a scientific illustrator
57:57: There really has been a rich history of studying navigation in non-mammals

Podcast links

Website: https://geni.us/bjks-pod
Twitter: https://geni.us/bjks-pod-twt

Ricky's links

Website: https://geni.us/patel-web
Google Scholar: https://geni.us/patel-scholar
Twitter: https://geni.us/patel-twt

Ben's links

Website: https://geni.us/bjks-web
Google Scholar: https://geni.us/bjks-scholar
Twitter: https://geni.us/bjks-twt

References
Beetz, Kraus, Franzke, Dreyer, Strube-Bloss, Rössler, Warrant, Merlin, & El Jundi, B. (2022). Flight-induced compass representation in the monarch butterfly heading network. Current Biology.
O'Keefe & Dostrovsky (1971). The hippocampus as a spatial map: Preliminary evidence from unit activity in the freely-moving rat. Brain research.
Patel, Kempenaers & Heinze. (2022). Vector navigation in walking bumblebees. Current Biology.
Patel & Cronin (2020). Mantis shrimp navigate home using celestial and idiothetic path integration. Current Biology.
Patel & Cronin (2020). Landmark navigation in a mantis shrimp. Proceedings of the Royal Society B.
Patel & Cronin (2020). Path integration error and adaptable search behaviors in a mantis shrimp. Journal of Experimental Biology.
Santschi (1911). Obervations et remarques critiques sur le mécanisme de l'orientation chez les fourmis. Rév Suisse Zool.
Tolman (1948). Cognitive maps in rats and men. Psychological review.
Wehner (1990). On the brink of introducing sensory ecology: Felix Santschi (1872–1940) — Tabib-en-Neml. Behav Ecol Sociobiol .