Full Description
At the beginning of the century, Karl von Frisch inaugurated the experimental analysis of bee behavior with his studies on form and color vision. Since then, experimental analysis of bee behavior has been extended to their orientation in space and time, sensory capabilities, and communication within a social group. How does a creature with a brain volume of scarcely one cubic millimeter generate such varied and complex behavior? This volume represents the latest research on the behavior and neurobiology of bees. Topics include: dance communication, foraging and search behavior, decision making, color vision, learning and memory, structure and function of brain neurons, immunocytological characterization of neuropils and identified neurons,and neuropharmacological studies of stereotyped and learned behavior. Together these papers illustrate the challenge that bee behavior presents to the neuroethologist as well as the progress that this field has made in recent years in the tradition of von Frisch's pioneering work.
Contents
Evolution and Genetics.- The Evolution of Honeybees.- Behavior Genetics of Honeybees (Apis mellifera L.).- The Foraging Honeybee.- Social Foraging by Honeybees: How a Colony Tracks Rich Sources of Nectar.- New Perspectives on the Dance Orientation of the Asian Honeybees.- Perception of Foraging Costs and Intakes, and Foraging Decisions.- The Bee's E-Vector Compass.- Physiological Aspects of Behavior.- Texture Sensitivity in the Life of Honeybees.- Thermoregulation by Individual Honeybees.- Sleep Research on Honeybees: Neurophysiology and Behavior.- Behavioral and Pharmacological Analysis of the Stinging Response in Africanized and Italian Bees.- Visual System.- The Structural Basis of Information Processing in the Visual System of the Bee.- Processing of Visual Information in the Honeybee Brain.- Motion Sensitive Descending Interneurons, Ocellar LD Neurons and Neck Motoneurons in the Bees A Neural Substrate for Visual Course Control in Apis mellifera.- Color Vision in Honeybees: Metric, Dimensions, Constancy, and Ecological Aspects.- The Ocellar System of the Honeybee.- Neuroanatomy and Signal Processing in the Brain.- Chemical Neuroanatomy of the Honeybee Brain.- Synaptic Connectivity in the Mushroom Bodies of the Honeybee Brain: Electron Microscopy and Im munocytochemistry of Neuroactive Compounds.- Immunohistochemical Localization of a Gastrin/CCK-like Peptide in the Brain of the Honeybee.- Biogenic Amines and the Bee Brain.- Neural Signal Processing in the Median Protocerebrum of the Bee.- Development.- Hormonal Regulation of Age Polyethism in the Honeybee, Apis mellifera.- Organization and Plasticity of the Olfactory System of the Honeybee, Apis mellifera.- Learning and Memory.- Flower-shape, Landmark, and Locale Memory in Honeybees.- Memory Traces in Honeybees.
