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What happens to a caterpillar's brain and nervous system during its transformation to a butterfly? Does it remain? Is it completely replaced? What is the likeli
by bmitc 4y ago
What happens to a caterpillar's brain and nervous system during its transformation to a butterfly? Does it remain? Is it completely replaced? What is the likelihood that a butterfly remembers its life as a caterpillar?
- rcme 4y agoSeems like you could test that via negative stimulus. Introduce a negative stimulus like a shock associated with something perceivable by both the caterpillar and butterfly. After conditioning the caterpillar, see if the butterfly shares the same aversion to the stimulus.
- villaaston1 4y agoThis has been tested! In moths at least: > Manduca sexta caterpillars received an electrical shock associatively paired with a specific odor in order to create a conditioned odor aversion, and were assayed for learning in a Y choice apparatus as larvae and again as adult moths. We show that larvae learned to avoid the training odor, and that this aversion was still present in the adults. https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0001736 https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal...
- Grothendank 4y ago[flagged]
- cdbyr 4y agoThe article mentions that memories are maintained - I didn’t see a source, but here is an article about it: https://www.newscientist.com/article/dn13412-butterflies-remember-caterpillar-experiences/ https://www.newscientist.com/article/dn13412-butterflies-rem...
- f5ve 4y agoThe caterpillar turns to mush. Its nervous system seamlessly morphs into a new one. Many neurons are retained, some are pruned, and some new ones are formed. This is why certain memories can be retained and certain ones can't.
- lbotos 4y agoI remember being taught this as a child and iirc recent studies say it doesn’t mush. EDIT: "Textbooks will commonly talk about the insect dissolving into a kind of “soup”, but that’s not entirely accurate. Some organs stay intact. Others, like muscles, break down into clumps of cells that can be re-used, like a Lego sculpture decomposing into bricks. And some cells create imaginal discs—structures that produce adult body parts. There’s a pair for the antennae, a pair for the eyes, one for each leg and wing, and so on. So if the pupa contains a soup, it’s an organised broth full of chunky bits." https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/article/3-d-scans-caterpillars-transforming-butterflies-metamorphosis https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/article/3-d-scans...