Connected on 2012-03-22 09:30:00
from Cook, Illinois, United States
- 7:32 am
- Bugscope Teamsample is now pumping down
- 8:25 am
- Bugscope Teamgood morning!
- Bugscope Teamwelcome to Bugscope!
- Bugscope Teamwe are just starting to make presets for today's session
- Bugscope Teamit starts at 9:30, right?
- Bugscope TeamStMike can you see our messages?
- 8:31 am
- 8:37 am
- 8:43 am
- 8:48 am
- 8:54 am
- 9:00 am
- Bugscope TeamHi John!
- 9:06 am
- 9:12 am
- 9:23 am
- GuestGood Morning everyone
- Bugscope Teamhello!
- TeacherGood morning - the students are just entering - we'll be ready in about 5 minutes.
Bugscope TeamGood morning!
- Bugscope Teamwe are ready to roll!
- TeacherWe practiced yesterday - and I think we're all set.
- Bugscope TeamSaintMike you have control of the microscope
- GuestGood morning!
Bugscope TeamHi Hailey!
- GuestHi Hailey!
- Bugscope TeamPlease let us know when you have questions.
- Guestthank you :)
- Bugscope Teamthis is a housefly
- Bugscope Teamit is a little bit beat up, we're sorry
- Bugscope Teamthis is the head of a very small beetle
- 9:28 am
- Bugscope Teamyou can see its mandibles, four palps (accessory mouthparts), its compound eyes, and its antennae
- Bugscope TeamHello to BK and Beth as well!
- Bugscope Teamthis is one of the moth's claws
- Bugscope Teammoths are hard to image using SEM because they are covered with scales, and the scales do not conduct electrons very well
- GuestIs this still the claw?
- TeacherDo we know what type of moth this is?
Bugscope Teamwe don't know exactly. it was one of those medium-sized brown moths
- Bugscope Teamthis is a very small hexapod, likely related to springtails
- 9:33 am
- Bugscope Teamhexapods resemble insects
- Bugscope Teamyou can see that it has tiny little bump-like eyes
- Bugscope Teamlike the eyes of a caterpillar -- a larval insect -- that are called 'stemmata.'
- Teacherare the dots we are seeing pores?
Bugscope Teamno those are patterns on the exoskeleton. The pores are where you see hairs coming out
- Bugscope Teaminsects and other comparable arthropods do not have skin like we do -- they have an exoskeleton that is more like a shell, or a coat of armor
- Bugscope Teambecause they don't have skin, like us, they don't have nerve endings that sense touch, or hot/cold
- Bugscope Teamtheir cuticle, which is what the exoskeleton is called, is made of a protein called chitin. it is similar to what our fingernails are made of
- Bugscope Teamin order to be able to sense their environment, insects have what are called 'setae' (pronounced see-tee), which look like hairs to us, sticking through the cuticle
- 9:39 am
- Bugscope Teamsetae can be mechano (touch) sensory, thermo (hot/cold) sensory, and/or chemo (smell/scent) sensory.
- Bugscope Teamthis is an aphid
- Bugscope Teamaphids can give birth to live aphid females without mating
- Teacherhow are you able to upload images so quickly?
Bugscope Teamyou are driving a $600,000 scanning electron microscope -- controlling it from your classroom. the software our programmers wrote is optimized for collecting the live images and sending them as soon as possible
- GuestSo is there a male or female?
Bugscope Teamthere can be males and females. I'm not sure which this one is. The females do mate with the males at the end of the year and lay eggs on plants to overwinter.
- Bugscope Teamthe Bugscope software accesses the instrument using machine language to make things go as quickly as possible
- Guestinteresting
- Bugscope Teammost aphids are wingless. When the need to migrate because there isn't enough food around, then the next batch of young aphids will have wings
- Bugscope Teamyou can see one of the compound eyes, to the north here
- 9:44 am
- Bugscope Teamcompound eyes are helpful, not only because they allow better peripheral vision, but because they pick up changes in the visual field very quickly
- Bugscope Teamthat is one reason why it is hard to swat a fly
- Bugscope Teamthis is a very small beetle
- Bugscope Teamthe pointy things you see at the bottom of the present image are palps, which help the beetle taste and also manipulate its food
- Bugscope Teamthe mandibles open left and right, unlike ours of course
- 9:50 am
- TeacherAre they able to grasp food with thier palps?
Bugscope Teamthe palps don't grasp the food as much as push it in the direction of the mouth
- Bugscope Teamkind of like how our tongue works
- Bugscope Teamyou can see the ball and socket joint that attaches the base of the antenna to the head
- Bugscope Teaminsect communication relies highly on chemical signals, and much of the chemical signalling is detected via the antennae
- TeacherBecause the antennae is attached to ball and socket joint, is it movable?
Bugscope Teamyes! like the ball and socket that attaches the human femur to the pelvis
- TeacherWhat is able to detect the chemical signals?
Bugscope Teamthere are special setae that can read the signals
- Bugscope Teamthe tiny spines we see on the ball portion of the antenna here help the beetle sense the position of its antenna
- 9:55 am
- GuestWhat is that substance on the ball and socket joint that looks kind of like dust accumulation?
Bugscope Teamit is something that doesn't belong on the insect, like dust or dirt.
- GuestOh okay thank you!
- Bugscope Teamsome of the very small setae we see are not sensory -- they are called microsetae or sometimes microtrichae. they form patterns that make species identifiable to other insects, and sometimes they form colors; they also likely help with thermoregulation
- Bugscope Teamthese are the mandibles of the pseudoscorpion, with (across the lower left) one of its lobster-like claws
- Bugscope Teamthey live around here and are very small
- Bugscope Teamthey are arachnids, so they come from the same family as spiders and scorpions, but they do not have stinging tails like scorpions
- Teacherwhat are those feather like things near the mandibles
Bugscope Teamthey could be a different type of palp
- 10:01 am
- Bugscope Teampseudoscorpions live in the dirt and are thought to eat tiny arthropods that are also found there
- Bugscope Teamthis is a mechanosensory hair on the extended claw
- GuestThis was very interesting. Thank you for letting me join your session. This is definetly something I will have my own students do.
Bugscope Teamthanks for joining us today
- Bugscope Teamthose feathery palps likely have a filter-like function
- Teacherwhy is the opening for the seteae really wide?
Bugscope Teamwe see them like this sometimes, and I am not sure. the opening may have a chemosensory function as well
- Teacheris the mechanasensory hair a type of seteae or is something else
Bugscope Teamit is a type of seta (singular of setae)
- 10:06 am
- Bugscope Teamnow we can see the sawtooth like portion of the claw, in the lower left
- Bugscope Teamthis resembles the pore we just looked at, but it is a spiracle, which is a pore through which insects breathe
- TeacherAre there many of these on an ant?
- TeacherWhat is a spiracle
Bugscope Teamit is a breathing hole for insects. They don't breathe through their mouths. There is a trachea that runs through the body to supply oxygen to it and is connected to the spiracles
- Bugscope Teamspiracles can be opened or closed by the insect, so it can 'hold its breath' when necessary
- Bugscope Teamwe had also made a preset of a thoracic spiracle on a fly, and there you can see that it is protected by a mesh of setae that presumably keep dust out
- Bugscope Teamthere it is!
- Bugscope Teaminsects have a head, two antennae, a thorax, and an abdomen
- 10:11 am
- Bugscope Teamthey also have six legs, as adults, and the legs are attached to the thorax
- Bugscope Teamspiracles are paired, usually one on each side of a body segment
- Bugscope Teamthis is something interesting we found only this morning while we were setting up for your session
- Bugscope Teamspringtails are not as well-studied as other insects
- Teacherdo you mean you found this insect in a lab
Bugscope Teaman entomologist who specializes in springtails (Collembola) had given it to us. but we were surprised to find scales on its cuticle.
- Bugscope Teamscales are actually modified setae. they are found on butterflies, moths, silverfish, mosquitoes, and few other insects
- Teacherwhat is the cuticle
Bugscope Teamit's basically the exoskeleton
- Bugscope Teamso this adds to the insects we know of that may have scales
- Teacherdo you see repeating patterns on many insects
Bugscope Teamyes we do! it is really cool to see
- Bugscope Teamscales have a thermoregulatory function. they also seem to function similarly to the way feathers work on a bird's wing
- 10:16 am
- Teacherwe want to thank you for this opportunity. we have to sign off for now
- Bugscope TeamThank You!
- Bugscope Teamthanks for joining us today!
- Bugscope Teamhttps://bugscope.beckman.illinois.edu/members/2011-155
- Bugscope Teambelow is your member page
- Bugscope Teamthe images and a transcript of today's session are stored on that page
- TeacherThank you again - I am the teacher - but all prior comments/questions had been written by my students. I 'guided from the side' but they were doing the controlling/generating of questions. I think we could have kept exploring for hours. The additional information you gave as we selected slides was phenomenal!!
- Bugscope Teamglad everything went so well. That is great to hear!
- TeacherHave a great day!
- Bugscope TeamYou Too! Thank You!
- Bugscope Teamsigning out...
- Bugscope TeamBye!
- TeacherBye
- Bugscope Teamsee you next year!
- 10:21 am
- Bugscope TeamJohn and Hailey are you still here?
