A Tethered system to investigate the behavioral changes of the silk moth for chemical plume tracing

Abstract

We developed a Tethered system which measures the locomotion of the silk moth (Bombyx Mori) upon stimulation. The Bombykol, which is the synthetic pheromone, is used as the stimuli and we investigate the changes in chemical plume tracing (CPT) behavior of the moth. We consider the importance of this study for biomimetic of its CPT behavior. The locomotion observations are classified into elemental motions and used to estimate the stimuli time. The estimation accuracy is then used for CPT behavior analysis. Preliminary results show good estimation accuracy and suggest a declining CPT behavior in the time domain.