Connected on 2010-10-19 19:00:00 from Hayward, CA, US
- 5:45pm
- Bugscope Team venting...
- Bugscope Team sample is now in, and the vacuum chamber is pumping down
- Bugscope Team closer...
- Bugscope Team 1.5 x 10-4 mBar
- Bugscope Team 1.4
- Bugscope Team 1.3
- 5:53pm
- 6:00pm
- 6:07pm
- 6:12pm
- 6:23pm
- 6:29pm
- 6:35pm
- 6:40pm
- 6:45pm
- 6:51pm
- Bugscope Team okay we are ready to roll!
- Bugscope Team brb
- Teacher Right on! I am just about to introduce the live session to my students. Thank you for being here!
- Bugscope Team hello!
- Bugscope Team you have control
- Bugscope Team 29 presets
- Bugscope Team this is a grasshopper claw
- 6:56pm
- Bugscope Team 321x
- 7:01pm
- Bugscope Team wasp head
- Teacher Thanks for the narrative - we like this image :)
- Bugscope Team not much of a narrative
- Teacher Scott tell us about this wasp.
- Bugscope Team I was trying to figure out what the spore containing bodies are called
- Bugscope Team this is a wasp I found in the stairwell this morning
- Bugscope Team you can see that it has mandibles, like those of other insects, that open from side to side like a gate
- Bugscope Team and you can see its compound eyes, which have thousands of ommatidia -- the individual facets of the eye
- Bugscope Team you can also see the antennae, which to many insects are at least as important as the eyes. to ants, which are closely related to wasps, they are likely more important
- 7:07pm
- Bugscope Team antennae have lots of sensory setae and other organs such as placoid sensilla, on them
- Bugscope Team sensory setae are found all over the exoskeleton; some are chemosensory, some are mechanosensory, and some may be thermosensory
- Teacher placoid sensilla???
- Bugscope Team many flying insects, like bees, and this wasp, also have simple eyes, called ocelli, on top of the head -- three of them
- Bugscope Team placoid just means 'plate-shaped,' and they resemble, often, oval pushbuttons
- Bugscope Team in some cases the placoid sensilla seem to give the insect information about how the particular limb they are on may be deforming
- Bugscope Team or just changing shape, but stressed so that the insect can sense the stress
- Bugscope Team now we are on one of the compound eyes
- Bugscope Team you can compare it to the moth eye, which appears to be much more complex
- 7:12pm
- Bugscope Team wasps like sugary stuff, but they don't make honey like bees do
- Bugscope Team you can see that the jaws -- the mandibles -- are serrated, or like forks
- Teacher We are fascintaed by the mouth. Why the "overbite?"
- Bugscope Team if it didn't have an overbite it wouldn't fully close
- Teacher Do they have tongues?
- Bugscope Team you can see the edge of one of the palps just beneath the rear mandible
- Bugscope Team some insects have what function like tongues, but I don't think the wasp does
- Bugscope Team bees have something called a 'glossa' that is much like a tongue
- Teacher What is the function of the small setae on the "upper lip"?
- Bugscope Team there are usually four palps -- two mandibular and two maxillary, that help the insect manipulate and taste its food
- Teacher Can you drive us to: edge of one of the palps just beneath the rear mandible
- Bugscope Team we don't know if they are mechanosensory
- Bugscope Team these are much more obvious on the ant mouth
- Bugscope Team if you click on that preset
- Bugscope Team and they are Hymenoptera as well -- they're related!
- 7:17pm
- Bugscope Team palps are small accessory limbs that help insects eat
- Bugscope Team they don't count as legs or arms
- Bugscope Team yay! Ants often look like they have an entirely separate critter in their mouths
- Bugscope Team you can see the mandibles, again
- Bugscope Team ants have a long first segment of the antenna, whereas wasps do not
- Teacher Whoah - now you got us excited!
- Bugscope Team sorry I just wiped out the other confuser
- 7:23pm
- Teacher ??
- Bugscope Team lot of detail in the antenna, but it is foreshortened quite a bit in this view
- Bugscope Team this is interesting -- I am not sure what it is but it seems much like an ear drum
- Bugscope Team on the grasshopper's leg
- Bugscope Team there is so much to know about insects, and we barely touch the surface
- Bugscope Team most insects do not have ears
- Bugscope Team they sense vibration (sound) using their setae
- Bugscope Team spiders have plumose setae that are especially sensitive to vibration
- Bugscope Team praying mantises are said to have a single large ear on the thorax
- Bugscope Team not sure that we have seen it for sure
- Bugscope Team just like roly polies, which are crustaceans, are said to have gills
- Bugscope Team I am sure they do, but we have not seen them for sure
- 7:28pm
- Bugscope Team grasshoppers often have an inflatable ball-like membrane called an arolium between their claws
- Bugscope Team they can puff it up with hemolymph, and it helps them hold onto a surface
- Bugscope Team most of the insects we see have, instead, tenent setae on a pad called a p
- Bugscope Team pulvillus
- Bugscope Team tenent from tenir, or tener, to hold
- Teacher Can you tell us what this is?
- Bugscope Team it's a little ball that holds a boatload of mold spores
- Bugscope Team when it pops open it flings them all over
- Bugscope Team you can see some mold spores now
- Bugscope Team often they are caved in, flattened on one side
- Teacher What is this on?
- Bugscope Team they resemble red blood cells
- Bugscope Team in a way
- Bugscope Team this is the abdomen of a cranefly
- Bugscope Team the head is to the north, but it is also a preset so you need not drive
- Bugscope Team now you can see one of the halteres
- 7:33pm
- Teacher What is a halteres? Can you drive us to one?
- Bugscope Team halteres are what Diptera -- two winged -- flies use to balance themselves in flight
- Bugscope Team the halteres beat with a motion opposite that of the wings
- Bugscope Team you can see the haltere now -- it's a long stick with a shrunken boxing speedbag at the end
- Bugscope Team they look like speedbags when they're not, like, desiccated
- Bugscope Team when we use the microCT to look at them, they have some kind of mineral inside, at least the ones we've seen, and we assume that it adds weight to the haltere
- Teacher Thanks for all the information. This is Steve and Eric
Bugscope Team hi you guys!
- Bugscope Team this is an ant's claw, one of six of course
- Teacher Is the body in the middle also like an ariolum in the claw of the wasp?
Bugscope Team yes that's right!
- 7:39pm
- Teacher Is it strictly for grip? on an object, or perhaps to amnipulate objects?
- Teacher *manipulate
- Bugscope Team we think it is to help hold onto a surface, but certainly it could help in manipulating something
- Teacher why is the abdomen scaly
Bugscope Team the scaly shape may provide strength, may make the abdomen more resistant to being squished
- 7:44pm
- Bugscope Team also, the scaliness may make the ant appear shiny black
- Bugscope Team sometimes, like on the click beetle, those tiny features make it look extra shiny
- Bugscope Team and things like that help other insects recognize it
- Bugscope Team with ants, though, they really do most of their business using their antennae
- Bugscope Team pheromones are a big deal
- Bugscope Team some ant species don't even bother to have eyes
- Bugscope Team this is another hymenopteran
- Bugscope Team with hairy eyeballs
- Bugscope Team fruit flies have small stiff bristles in between the ommatidia that help them monitor windspeed and direction
- Teacher why do they have hairy eyeballs?
Bugscope Team not sure
Bugscope Team probably to help catch more pollen since the hairs are similar to the body hairs
- 7:49pm
- Bugscope Team this is a badboy killer insect
- Bugscope Team and old-school; they've been around for millions of years
- Teacher tell us some interesting facts about the dragonfly?
- Bugscope Team they are one of the fastest flying insects
- Bugscope Team they have four wings, and they get along just fine without having to hook them together to fly, like bees and wasps
- Bugscope Team dragonflies have little hooks on the back of their head to help hold their head on when they're mating
- Guest the teacher got logged out
Bugscope Team so we gave you control...
- Bugscope Team www you can drive now if you want
- Bugscope Team dragonflies heads fall off easily
- Bugscope Team yes they are super agile; I'm sorry I don't know how fast it translates to
- Teacher What is all the confetti looking stuff?
- Teacher how fast can the fastest dragonfly fly?
Bugscope Team they can fly 19-38mph!
- Bugscope Team also, if you look up close (use the preset, actually), you can see that the dragonfly also scarfed up at least one leafhopper
- 7:54pm
- Bugscope Team go to the brochosomes preset
- Bugscope Team this is something we rarely see
- Bugscope Team the busted wing scale
- Teacher Can you please take us to the scarfed up leafhopper, oh wise one.
- Bugscope Team okay let me focus this with the microscope
- Bugscope Team this is all that's left of the leafhopper
- Teacher How fast do they beat their wings?
Bugscope Team It is estimated in some species of Darners to be around 28 beats per second.
- Teacher Thanks Cate!!
- Teacher What is a brochosome?
Bugscope Team they are spherical and sometimes oval little particles that are produced in the Malpighian tubules and applied to the exoskeleton in an 'anointing function'
- Teacher and arent they super agile?
Bugscope Team they have great visual responses and with their speed, that makes them pretty agile in flight
- 7:59pm
- Bugscope Team its head is mostly eyes
- Bugscope Team brochosomes are made only by leafhoppers
- Teacher Very cool information! This is Dr. korb again... we are signing off for the night! Thanks for everything!
- Teacher Very cool information! This is Dr. korb again... we are signing off for the night! Thanks for everything!
- Bugscope Team Thank you!
- Guest Is there a link?
- Guest How can we do this with our elementary school students?
Bugscope Team if you go to the Bugscope home page you can fill out an application
- Bugscope Team If you went to https://bugscope.beckman.uiuc.edu/ you there are easy to follow directions on filling out an application
- Guest okay, thank you so much!
- Bugscope Team https://bugscope.beckman.illinois.edu/
- Guest you guys were amazing!
- Bugscope Team D'Oh!
- Bugscope Team Thank You!
- Bugscope Team if you have access to multiple computers (assuming they are old enough to use them by themselves) you can even have them each log in if you wanted
- Guest wonderful
- Guest we greatly appreciate it
- Bugscope Team Yes! often we can let the kids drive, if *you* let them
- 8:06pm
- Bugscope Team wahwahwah we are out the door -- Thank You!
