caterpillars

[Norman Albers]

I just heard an interesting report on radio that a woman trained caterpillars by exposing them to a chemical odor and then giving them a mild electric shock. They learned to avoid the odor source. What was a cool experiment was allowing them to become butterflies, or whatever moths. These moths also avoided the chemical!

[DrP]

I have read about Worms and Rats actually inheriting memory from their ancestors that learnt mazes. Offspring of rats which had previously learnt a maze with food at the end of it apparently learnt the maze quicker than those whose parents had never seen the maze. However I think that this work may have been discredited and maybe proved false - I'll have to try and find some refferences rather than using my memory..

 

i think some groups even took things a bit too far and mushed up some rats that had run a maze and then fed them to other rats. Supposedly the rats that eat the rats that had already run the maze learnt the maze quicker. Again - could be BS though - I've never seen any properly published work - just web chat. I'll have a search arround when I get more time.

[Norman Albers]

I wonder if there is regeneration of at least a nerve stem as the chrysalis does its thing. What do they do?

[Mr Skeptic]

Yup, I read about the same thing in New Scientist, and thought it pretty amazing as well. Talk about childhood memories!

[Norman Albers]

It's not like they start with a single egg. We need a research search.