Odours detected by rhinophores mediate orientation to flow in the nudibranch mollusc, Tritonia diomedea.
2006
SUMMARY Tritonia diomedea is a useful neuroethological model system that
can contribute to our understanding of the neural control of navigation. Prior
work on both sensory and locomotory systems is complemented by recent field
experiments, which concluded that these animals primarily use a combination of
odours and water flow as guidance cues. We corroborate these field results by
showing similar navigation behaviours in a flow tank. Slugs crawled upstream
towards both prey and conspecifics, and turned downstream after crawling into
a section of the flow tank downstream of a predator. Controls without upstream
odour sources crawled apparently randomly. We then tested whether these
behaviours depend on odours detected by the rhinophores. Outflow from a header
tank was used to generate prey, predator and unscented control odour plumes in
the flow tank. Slugs with rhinophores crawled upstream towards a prey odour
plume source, turned downstream in a predator odour plume, and showed no
reaction to a control plume. Slugs without rhinophores behaved similarly to
controls, regardless of odour plume type. Finally, we used extracellular
recordings from the rhinophore nerve to demonstrate that isolated rhinophores
are chemosensitive. Afferent activity increased significantly more after
application of all three odour types than after unscented control
applications. Responses were odour specific. We conclude that rhinophores
mediate orientation to flow, and suggest that future work should focus on the
integration of mechanosensation and chemosensation during navigation in T.
diomedea .
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