Connected on 2010-02-03 10:00:00 from Latexo, TX, US
- 9:01am
- Bugscope Team pumping down, waiting for vacuum. at 1.8
- Bugscope Team hi
- Bugscope Team welcome to bugscope
- Bugscope Team hi
- Teacher yep, i see you
- Bugscope Team Hello!
- Bugscope Team Oh.....
- Bugscope Team Hi!
- Bugscope Team O.k.
- Bugscope Team My name is Jungkoo Kang
- Bugscope Team I am an entomology-grad student.
- Bugscope Team Yes!
- Bugscope Team Thank you. I need to get a candy bar right now.
- 9:06am
- Bugscope Team Aha!
- Bugscope Team Is this a specimen from students?
- Bugscope Team no these are all from our collection
- Bugscope Team Oh. my god...
- Bugscope Team I love this machine.
- 9:12am
- Bugscope Team Tracey, we are setting up presets now
- Bugscope Team Presets are interesting places that Tracey can click on any time and the scope will move to that location
- Teacher Ok
- Teacher 5th grade students will be watching as well. So any information about what we are seeing would be appreciated.
- Bugscope Team O.k.
- Bugscope Team Oh yeah, totally, we will be chatting about what you are seeing
- Bugscope Team Normally the teacher would ask all kinds of questions
- Bugscope Team and students that are logged in would ask questions too
- Bugscope Team but if it's only Tracey logged in, then we can try to just chat more about what we are seeing on the screen
- Teacher Oh we will have lots of questions. We have been studying adaptations of insects.
- Bugscope Team because we don't want her to have to type 10 questions every second!
- Bugscope Team Sounds great. We will try to answer every question
- Bugscope Team Also, make sure to note your bugscope member page. This will contain all the chat and images from today's session, Tracey and her students can review that page anytime after the session is done: http://bugscope.beckman.illinois.edu/members/2009-160
- 9:18am
- Bugscope Team We knew that you wanted to image/study parasites, but we don't really have what we think of as parasites right now. (Such as parastic wasps that inject eggs into caterpillars.) So we will be able to answer some questions but we are sorry that we do not have good physical/viewable examples right now.
- Bugscope Team of course aphids like these are thought of as plant parasites
- Bugscope Team cornicle!
- Bugscope Team Woow!
- Bugscope Team Sad fly..
- Teacher Well to be honest I had not gotten far enough in my TEKS to get to the symbosis. So if we could view the features of the bugs that help them to survive in their environment would be great.
Bugscope Team That sounds great!
- Bugscope Team Lil J you can likely help identify these Hemiptera like this for example better than we can.
- 9:23am
- Bugscope Team I will try it.
- Bugscope Team We like, particularly, insects that are specialists at what they do, compared to, for example, crickets and roaches that are generalists.
- Bugscope Team Lil J what we are doing now is making the presets that run along the right side of the chat and are available to the Teacher to click on. Clicking on the thumbnails will drive the microscope to that place on the stub.
- Bugscope Team The session does not start officially until 10 a.m.
- Bugscope Team Presently Tracey can chat with us but does not yet have control of the microscope because we are setting things up.
- Bugscope Team here is a generalist...
- Bugscope Team I can see a pin hole!
Bugscope Team oh yeah! how did that get there?
- Teacher one question: Do you have a gnat?
- Bugscope Team not sure -- we'll have to ask Cate what's on the stub this morning
- 9:28am
- Teacher Honeybee stinger?
- Bugscope Team We don't have any honeybees today, sorry
- Bugscope Team this is someone else's stinger
- Bugscope Team this is a stinger/ovipositor from a parasitic wasp
- Bugscope Team stingers are modified ovipositors
- Bugscope Team and can sometimes serve both purposes
- Bugscope Team Tracey part of the deal is that in the dead of winter like this we do not have access to fresh samples, so we have to use what we have.
- 9:34am
- Bugscope Team Cells in moth compound eyes look totally different from those in fly compound eyes!
Bugscope Team yes they do. they seem to have another level of complexity.
- Bugscope Team ocelli!
- Bugscope Team Oh!
- Bugscope Team stemmata!
- Bugscope Team juj
- Bugscope Team u
- 9:39am
- Bugscope Team Adaptation.....
- Bugscope Team It is zen.
- Bugscope Team Genetic mutation, genetic draft, adaptation,...
- Bugscope Team Lil J the school will be most interested in adaptations that each insect/arthropod has.
- Bugscope Team O.k.
- Bugscope Team this caterpillar had an aphid on its back
- Bugscope Team looks like...
- 9:46am
- Teacher We are good with that. Here in Texas we still have quite a few insects still out. So, when we get really started can we use laymens terms?
- Bugscope Team we can try that -- some of the things we're talking about may not have common names, but we can explain what they do
- 9:52am
- Bugscope Team Tracey we are ready to roll, as soon as you wish.
- Bugscope Team You now have control of the microscope.
- Bugscope Team we are not making a preset of this but it is a cool view of the inside of the June bug's antenna
- 9:58am
- Bugscope Team we are ready anytime, let us know when you are
- 10:04am
- Teacher genetic
- Bugscope Team Hi Tracey!
- Bugscope Team Welcome to Bugscope!
- Bugscope Team Hello!
- Bugscope Team this is a housefly
- Bugscope Team This is the Head of a Fly
- Bugscope Team usually we can tell the males from the females because the eyes in females are far apart, whereas those of males are close together
- Bugscope Team and this is a spiracle
- Bugscope Team 'doh
- Teacher ok
- Bugscope Team if you take the magnification down you can see where you are on the insect's body
- Teacher Hello
- Teacher Thank you
- Bugscope Team Hello!
- Bugscope Team Hello!
- Bugscope Team Please ask us any questions you have about what you are seeing
- Bugscope Team We are hear to help guide your Bugscope session
- Bugscope Team here, I mean
- Bugscope Team cool!
- Bugscope Team you can see lots of tiny hairs called microsetae that are on the surface of the abdomen of this bug
- Teacher Is that hair around it?
Bugscope Team Well, not hair like our hair. They are called setae (pronouced see-tee), they help it to sense their environment
- 10:10am
- Teacher What is the purpose?
- Bugscope Team Like air flow
- Bugscope Team one seta, multiple setae
- Bugscope Team sense of contact
- Bugscope Team some setae are known as chemosensory, which means that they can sense smells in the air
- Bugscope Team the very fine setae may not be connected to nerves; they may have other purposes
- Teacher Can germs or bacteria enter the spiracles
Bugscope Team certainly they could -- the openings are large enough. but there are often filter-like combs inside that help keep dust and perhaps bacteria out
- Bugscope Team Insects have a hard outer shell, called an exoskeleton, and they can't feel anything with that. The setae, however, stick through the exoskeleton, to nerves underneath, and that's how it feels things, senses things...
- Bugscope Team Setae can sense movement, taste, smells, wind, etc.
- Bugscope Team you can see the databar on the lower left side of the screen: it says 174 micrometers right now
- Teacher Is the setae hard or soft
Bugscope Team some of them are very hard, and some are more flexible; I would say that most of them are flexible to some extent
- Bugscope Team rod-shaped bacteria -- the bacilli -- are usually about 2 micrometers long, so they would easily fit into the spiracle opening
- 10:15am
- Bugscope Team now we see where we were. this is the abdomen -- the stomach, in a way -- of the true bug
- Teacher What is that located at the bottom?
Bugscope Team Well, it's probably dirt or grime, we call stuff like that Juju.
Bugscope Team piece of dirt or dust, we call it juju- stuff that isn't part of the insect
- Bugscope Team Tracey be sure to try some of the other presets so you get a chance to look at everything, if you would like
- Bugscope Team insects are often 'hairier' and dirtier than we would expect
- Bugscope Team You are doing great Tracey!
- Teacher What exactly is this
- Bugscope Team this is a haltere. that is a modified hindwing that moves opposite the beat of the wings
- Bugscope Team normally it would be rounded and plump, but it is dried
- Teacher What is it's purpose
Bugscope Team It helps to stabilize the insect during flight
- Bugscope Team the haltere balances the motion of the wings and keeps the insect stable in the air as it flies
- Teacher Is there teeth?
Bugscope Team Well, not teeth like ours, but some have mandibles that will help insects to gather food into their mouth area. Ant's have mandibles. Flies, of course, puke on their food, which dissolves some of the insides of other bugs, and then they suck up the puke juice with their proboscis
- Bugscope Team when we see those structures, which are quite small but heavy, we know we are looking at a fly
- Bugscope Team Notice that setae are found almost everywhere on insects...
- 10:21am
- Bugscope Team this is the tongue of the fly!
- Bugscope Team flies like this spit on their food and suck up what dissolves in their saliva
- Teacher Do the setae on the tongue work the same
Bugscope Team Great question! The setae on the tongue are chemosensory, and they can sense taste, and smell!
- Bugscope Team the tongue is dried out as well, and it does not look as plump as it did when the fly was alive
- Teacher Yes we studied how flies get their food and have all decided not to eat after a fly lands on our food!!
- Bugscope Team some of the setae on the tongue are touch sensitive, so the fly can feel what it is touching, but as Alex said, some are like tastebuds
- Bugscope Team now you can see the eyes, on either side of the head
- Teacher What are the dark parts on the head?
- Bugscope Team and the bases of the antennae
- Bugscope Team at the top, above the tongue, are two antennae, and one has part broken off
- Bugscope Team this is cool!
- 10:26am
- Bugscope Team now we see taste buds again, and they are on a stalk called a 'palp'
- Bugscope Team those little fingerlike things are what this June bug uses to help taste what it might like to eat
- Bugscope Team the palp looks like a Jet engine
- Bugscope Team you can see there is a lot of dirt and stuff there as well
- Teacher Are we looking at the feet
Bugscope Team these are palps, they kind of look like legs, but they are mouth parts. They are used to help the insect move around food or to taste food
- Bugscope Team these are the palps, so we are at the head of the June bug
- Bugscope Team the palps are much like feet
- Bugscope Team now you can see the whole head of the June bug
- Teacher what are the hairs by the abdomen
Bugscope Team those hairs are at the junction between the head and the thorax, and we think that they help the June bug, as Annie says, sense when it moves its head
- 10:32am
- Bugscope Team You can see the line of hairs on the "chin," these help the junebug to sense the position of its head
- Bugscope Team insects are different from us in many ways, and one is that they do not have an internal skeleton. instead they have a shell, called an exoskeleton, and it is like if you were wearing armor all of the time. you would not be able to feel what was touching you.
- Teacher what are the paddle shape things
Bugscope Team Those are the antennae.
- Bugscope Team so if you were wearing a coat of armor, and you pushed little sticks through the armor, you could feel when the sticks bumped into things. that is what setae do for insects.
- Teacher this is the straw they use to suck up food
Bugscope Team yes it is!
- Bugscope Team There are three segments hidden beneath the large end of the paddle. When the beetle was alive, he could spread those three segment apart. It would have looked like a little hand.
- Teacher we have smart students
- 10:37am
- Bugscope Team some of those proboscises, like that, have parts that move back and forth to help cut into what they are trying to pierce so they can suck up the juice inside
- Teacher what are the little bumps on the proboscis
Bugscope Team some of those bumps are dirt, and some of them are ridges that help cut into what they want to pierce
Bugscope Team I think those are juju's, just dirt and stuff
- Bugscope Team this is an aphid, so it pokes its proboscis into leaves and plant stems
- Bugscope Team so very lovely!
- Teacher do they have a stinger
Bugscope Team Aphids don't have stingers. They have two little bumps on their abdomens called cornicles. The cornicles secrete a sweet sap that ants like to eat.
- Teacher What color are they
Bugscope Team they are different colors: sometimes white, sometimes green, sometimes black, and I imagine brown
- Teacher in that case do ants eat them
Bugscope Team There are lots of species of ants and lots of species of aphids. But in some species, the ants will protect the aphids. They will tend them like cattle
Bugscope Team Ants try to protect them from other predators.
Bugscope Team What Ants is to aphids is what human being to cows.
- Bugscope Team sometimes instead of secreting nectar for ants to eat, the cornicles secrete very sticky glue that immnobilizes ants like a hot melt glue gun
- 10:43am
- Bugscope Team (that should have read 'immobilizes')
- Bugscope Team you can see the cornicles now
- Bugscope Team the flattened-ended tubes coming out of the back
- Teacher why do they want to protect them
Bugscope Team they can help each other
- Bugscope Team that gives a weird image of ants herding around aphids
- Bugscope Team In some species the ants will take the aphids from the plants, carry them into the nest to keep them safe for the winter, and then return them to plants in the spring.
- Bugscope Team I should not that not ALL ants tend or herd aphids. But some do, and that is really neat. Ants have evolved agriculture.
- Bugscope Team the ants can protect the aphids from other bad ants, and the aphids can produce sugary nectar that the ants like to eat
- Bugscope Team Symbiosis?
- Bugscope Team Or mutualism?
- Teacher we agree that it would be mutualism
Bugscope Team There are those smart students again.
- Bugscope Team many insects have trouble with ants, which can be voracious, eating anything in their path. so you often find that other insects have special defenses against ants bothering them. often they have chemicals that they release to discourage the ants from eating them.
- 10:50am
- Teacher so who are their enemies
- Bugscope Team Ladybird beetles!
- Bugscope Team Parasitoid wasps!
- Bugscope Team small wasps!
- Bugscope Team that's right! ladybugs, other ants, parasitic wasps, people with sprayers
- Bugscope Team and speaking of parasitoid wasps...
- Bugscope Team Lacewings
- Bugscope Team often when we look at mouthparts, like now, there is so much going on that it looks like there is another insect inside the mouth
- Teacher the segmented parts are the tongue?
Bugscope Team Those are palps, like we saw on the junebug earlier
- Teacher what are the horn looking parts
Bugscope Team the horned things are mandibles- jaws. The feathery part here is like the tongue
- 10:55am
- Bugscope Team now you can see the tongue as well
- Bugscope Team the thing with the ridges is the tongue, which is sometimes called a 'glossa'
- Bugscope Team do you know what this is?
- Teacher abdomen
Bugscope Team Right!
- Bugscope Team If you decrease the magnification and/or drive north you can see exactly where you are on the abdomen.
Bugscope Team no we wont, the abdomen is to the left somewhere. I broke it off because it was long
- Bugscope Team DOH!
- Bugscope Team Oh~no~
- Bugscope Team Nevermind me...
- Bugscope Team this is what insects use to sting, and also, in some insects, to lay their eggs deep into something like a fruit or a caterpillar
- 11:00am
- Teacher They find that cool
- Bugscope Team the ridges on the stinger help it cut into the prey, or the fruit
- Teacher okay now you reading our mind
- Bugscope Team the ridges also help the stinger stay in place
- Bugscope Team Or into aphids~!
- Bugscope Team if we had a honeybee stinger we would see that some of the ridges are more pronounced -- they are larger -- and when a honeybee stings you it leaves the sting in your skin
- Bugscope Team that is right -- if a tiny wasp was to sting an aphid...
- Teacher why does it hurt, how many stinger do they have
Bugscope Team Each bee or wasp has only one stinger. It hurts because they inject you with venom when they sting. The venom makes it itch and or hurt.
- Bugscope Team The movie, "alien", was inspired by parasitism in insects.
- 11:06am
- Teacher why do they attact
Bugscope Team Bees and wasp will sting when they feel threatened or if their hive is threatened. They very seldom sting without being provoked.
Bugscope Team Sometime, they lay eggs inside the aphid's body in order for their offsprins to eat it.
- Bugscope Team when a mosquito bites you, it uses its mouthparts, and there may be four different blade-like lancets that cut into your skin.
- Bugscope Team When mosquitoes bite, they inject a substance that numbs you--so you don't feel them biting you. This substance and the mosquito saliva are what makes mosquito bites itch.
- Bugscope Team Of course, this is not a mosquito...so I am going off topic.
- Bugscope Team yes what Jungkoo (J) says is correct. some wasps sting to immobilize their prey and also inject their own eggs into its body
- Bugscope Team I mentioned mosquitos as well, Annie...
- Bugscope Team Right, but I was afraid that I was going too far down the garden path....
- 11:12am
- Teacher no we studied that they inject an anticoagulant
- Bugscope Team with mosquitos it is only the female who bites, and she does it because she needs that blood meal in order to be able to successfully lay her eggs.
- Bugscope Team Yes, that too...I forgot about that....you are keeping me on my toes!
- Bugscope Team I learned only a few days ago that some mosquitos do not suck blood.
- Bugscope Team Some mosquito species live on nectar, like from flowers -- both males and females.
- Bugscope Team There is one species of mosquito that is predatory on other mosquitos as a larva
- Bugscope Team mosquito larvae live in water
- Teacher Do wasp attack other wasp
Bugscope Team YES!!!
Bugscope Team Scott! help me!
- Teacher reasons
- Bugscope Team sometimes it is just for defense of their territory
- Teacher how long is it's life expectancy
Bugscope Team It depends on the wasp. Social wasps that are workers live for 20 days or less sometimes. Drones can live longer, say maybe a month? Queens can live 12 months or more.
- 11:17am
- Teacher so if they attack it is because they are extremely territorial
Bugscope Team Sometimes. Other times, wasps will attack other wasps to eat them. Many wasps are predators of other insects.
- Bugscope Team Isn't it somewhat related to their size?
- Bugscope Team wasps are very aggressive
- Bugscope Team there is a paper someone wrote called "Wasp Eat Wasp"
- Bugscope Team "Wasp eat wasp: facultative hyperparasitism and intra-guild predation by bethylid wasps."
- Bugscope Team some wasps can be used to keep other wasps away from coffee, coconuts, and almonds
- Teacher please let me have the session numbers because we have to go to lunch, but we have ENJOYED this!!!!!!
Bugscope Team All the images and chat from today's session are saved to your member page: http://bugscope.beckman.illinois.edu/members/2009-160
- Bugscope Team A wasp can beat its wing up to 240 times a second!
- Bugscope Team There are many species of wasps that do not sting humans. They feed on plants. For example, figs are pollinated by tiny wasps.
- Bugscope Team that lets you know that some wasps actually bore into coffee beans, and coconuts, and almonds
- Bugscope Team Thank You!
- Bugscope Team member page: http://bugscope.beckman.illinois.edu/members/2009-160
- Bugscope Team thanks for participating in bugscope witj us
- Bugscope Team Eat healthy~!
- Bugscope Team Eat more vegetables~!
- Teacher will do ewwwwwww
- 11:22am
- Bugscope Team over and out!
- Bugscope Team Good Bye
- Bugscope Team Nice session everyone, closing things down now
- Bugscope Team member page: http://bugscope.beckman.illinois.edu/members/2009-160
- Bugscope Team Goodbye!
