Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com – @BednarChuck
For the first time, researchers have identified an internal sensor of the Earth’s magnetic field in an animal, finding evidence of a TV antenna-like structure located in the brain of a tiny species of worm, according to a new study published Wednesday in the journal eLife.
The structure was discovered at the tip of the AFD neuron in the worm C. elegans, scientists and engineers from the University of Texas at Austin explained in a statement. It could shed new light on the mystery about how the internal compasses of animals actually function.
The worms use this sensor to navigate underground, and according to research team member and assistant neuroscience professor Jon Pierce-Shimomura, the odds are that the same molecules are used by other creatures, including birds and butterflies, to find their way around. Their discovery “gives us a first foothold in understanding magnetosensation in other animals,” he added.
Findings could be used to protect crops from harmful pests
When hungry worms are placed in gelatin-filled tubes, they usually tend to move down, which the authors believe is a strategy the creatures use to hunt for food. However, when they brought in worms from other parts of the world, they found that they moved at a precise angle relative to how the magnetic field would have corresponded to down if they were home.
For example, worms imported from Australia moved upwards in the tubes. The orientation of the planet’s magnetic field varies from location to location, and the magnetic field sensors found in the worms is finely tunes to its local environment, allowing it to differentiate between down and up based on where it lives. Changing the worm’s location can throw this ability off.
The UT-Austin team uses C. elegans as part of their research into addiction and Alzheimer’s disease, and had previously discovered that the worms are able to sense humidity. Based on that work, they began to investigate what else the creatures were capable of sensing. They found their magnetosensory abilities by observing how the worms’ behavior changed in response to changes in the magnetic field around them.
Worms that had been genetically engineered to have a non-functioning AFD neuron were unable to orient themselves up and down the way normal worms do. They also used a technique called calcium imaging to demonstrate that changes in the magnetic field cause the AFD neuron to activate. Their findings could make it possible to protect agricultural crops from harmful pests through the manipulation of magnetic fields, the authors concluded.
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