Connected on 2012-11-01 12:30:00 from Hamilton, Ohio, United States
- 11:50am
- Bugscope Team haha this is not Cate
- 11:56am
- 12:01pm
- Bugscope Team Annie!
- Teacher Hi guys! We are going to have lecture and we will be with you in about 30 minutes.
- Bugscope Team Cate is sj right now and I am me.
- Bugscope Team this is the tsetse fly
- Bugscope Team I guess not -- its beak is too short
- 12:06pm
- Bugscope Team Hi Kevin!
- 12:12pm
- 12:18pm
- 12:31pm
- Bugscope Team I'm not Cate anymore.
- Guest hello
- 12:37pm
- Teacher Ummm.....how do they join as students?
Bugscope Team they should be able to select Student, but for some reason sometimes it does not show up as an option
- Bugscope Team we are happy to have them as Guests -- sorry that does not seem to be working today
- Teacher so, should they be guests?
Bugscope Team yes please
- Bugscope Team we can give them control either way
- Teacher awesome
- Bugscope Team Dr R you sent some critters we did not recognize.
- Bugscope Team exotic bugs
- Teacher haha, what do you expect
Bugscope Team we expected you to play certain tricks on us like that
- Teacher Can you give control to Chris Z?
Bugscope Team he has control
- Bugscope Team yes Scot got descriptive with some of the unknown insects
- Bugscope Team Fab
- 12:42pm
- Bugscope Team this is cool -- a nice clean proboscis on one of the moths
- Bugscope Team busted off palp there
- Guest whats the hole in the left?
Bugscope Team that is where one of the palpi was
- Bugscope Team you can see scales on and above the compound eye to the right
- Bugscope Team scales are modified setae
- Guest from this micrograph can we determine how the proboscis "zips"? Where are the points of mechanical interaction?
Bugscope Team prob'ly right in the middle
- Bugscope Team it is difficult to see just where, but that is good because if it was a loose connection there wouldn't be much suction
- Guest so how much did this microscope cost? can i get one from ebay?
Bugscope Team this one cost around $600,000 more than 10 years ago. You can get a much cheaper tabletop SEM (they are a lot smaller) but they don't get as good resolution
- Guest What is the maximum magnification of the SEM?
Bugscope Team this will go to about a million x but we can take meaningful publishable images only at a max of about 200,000x and sometimes 250,000x
- Bugscope Team if you got one of these on eBay it would still cost a lot to run it and also service it -- it has its own filtered electricity, nitrogen, water, AC, etc.
- Guest awwwwww
- Guest What enables the two halves of the proboscis to "stick" together?
Bugscope Team I am not positive they all zip.
- 12:47pm
- Teacher Can you give control to Joe?
Bugscope Team joe has control
- Guest What coating was used to prepare the specimens and how do apply it?
Bugscope Team we use a sputter coater to put about 20 nm of gold-palladium on the sample, and that is very thick compared to a normal research sample
- Guest Following Nick's question, if the proboscis is not stuck together like a zipper, are the two halves mechanically held together?
Bugscope Team I was thinking it was a coiled tube that formed that way rather than zipping like a mosquito proboscis with the fascicle inside
- Bugscope Team you can see that the tip of the stinger is charging up with electrons
- Guest why is the stinger split in half?
Bugscope Team when it goes into you it can cut side by side like an electric steak knife
- Guest awesome
- Bugscope Team also, stingers sometimes have something to deliver, like an egg; they are modified ovipositors
- Guest Is it possible to see hamuli linking together on this specimen?
Bugscope Team i dont think we were able to see them
- Bugscope Team the sputter coater pulls a vacuum; then we introduce argon gas; then we apply current to the gas and it glows as it becomes a plasma; permanent magnets attract the plasma to a thin foil of gold palladium; the gold-palladium atoms erode and shower the sample with Au/Pd atoms
- 12:52pm
- Bugscope Team you can go and check the wings; usually we watch for hamuli when we are checking a sample out for the first time
- Guest are those teeth on the upper right?
Bugscope Team they don't have teeth, but they often have ridged mandibles. Here we are on the end of the abdomen though.
- Guest why is the opening so big compared to the stinger?
Bugscope Team like it has more to do with the wasp being dead and dried a bit
Bugscope Team like, the opening at the tip of the abdomen is warped a little from drying
- Bugscope Team see how the mandibles open from side to side like a gate? and you can also see lots of palpi
- Guest What kind of surface features can we observe on the antennae?
Bugscope Team you can see setae, short setae-like elements, and placoid sensillae
- Guest do you have to wear special protective gear to work with the machines?
Bugscope Team not really, but with some pieces of equipment like the glow-discharge machine you have to be careful what you touch when so you don't get shocked
Bugscope Team most we wear is gloves to keep the oils on our fingers from contaminating some samples or vacuum of the machines
Bugscope Team good point
- Guest Can we see a close up of the chemoreceptors on the antenne when we're done looking at the mouth?
Bugscope Team that is up to your driver Joe
- 12:57pm
- Bugscope Team we had made a preset of the antenna as well
- Guest What are the little spots behind the specimen?
Bugscope Team that would be the carbon tape all the insects are sitting on
- Bugscope Team now you can see the long placoid sensillae, which I have been thinking may be more mechanoreceptors for proprioception
- Bugscope Team we are so close and the sample is charging enough that the image is distorting, sorry...
- Guest can we look at some insect penises(penii?)
Bugscope Team at the tip of the cranefly's abdomen you can see some genital features
- Guest What are all of the flakes? Are they sensory structures also?
Bugscope Team i'm not sure what the flakes are. They are some sort of debris that are not part of the insect
- Teacher haitong can drive now...smarty pants
Bugscope Team haitong has control
- Bugscope Team often when we work with entomologists and they are interested in the aedeagus, for example, they dissect it out so they can see it; often the genitalia are inside
- Guest *brachosome
- Bugscope Team this is the tip of the cranefly abdomen
- 1:03pm
- Bugscope Team those are kind of like shark claspers
- Bugscope Team probably help it attach to its mate in the air
- Bugscope Team like dragonfly mating
- Bugscope Team you can also see a scale there
- Bugscope Team it looks so much like a spider's chelicerae and fangs
- Guest What is the function of a brachosomes?
Bugscope Team the leafhoppers anoint themselves with them and it helps repell water. They also cover their eggs with them as well
- Teacher can you give kevin control?
Bugscope Team got it!
- Guest Regarding insect eyes: are the ommatidia typically the same size between different groups of insects, or is there a lot of variability there?
Bugscope Team I would say there is a large variation
Bugscope Team there is a variation within species, even, and perhaps between tasks, like workers and drones
- 1:08pm
- Guest So what are the bumps on the ommatidia?
Bugscope Team we think that they help channel light; some insects do not have them; some insects see UV and some do not
- Guest what are the little flakes from?
Bugscope Team some of the flakes are scales, and some are debris from the critical point dryer
- Guest whats a critical point dryer?
Bugscope Team we use the critical point dryer to process samples in ethanol through to liquid CO2, which can be removed from tissue above the critical point for CO2 and thus does not cause a destructive phase change and damage the tissue
- Guest What are these structures we are looking at here?
Bugscope Team these are special setae that enable the insect to walk on vertical surfaces
- Bugscope Team tenent setae. They act like velcro or suction cups
- Teacher NICK!
- Teacher ignore nick
- Guest Scot, can you describe the last lamp you bought?
Bugscope Team haha I dunno maybe an Artemide?
- Guest Dr. Ray mentioned you don't like beer.
Bugscope Team I have been drinking Shiners, like one or two, or Boulevard, sometimes, but often I get a headache right away
- Guest Are these tenent setae unique to dipterans or are they found in other orders as well?
Bugscope Team other orders as well
- 1:13pm
- Guest How did you end up operating the microscope?
- Guest hows are you doing today scot?
Bugscope Team haha Ask Cate I have been totally radical.
- Guest how are you cate?
- Guest What about these structures enables them to adhere to surfaces?
- Guest or octopus?
- Guest Are the tenent setae on insects similar to the mechanism that helps certain reptilians stick to walls.
- Guest Do these function the same way geckos feet do?
Bugscope Team when we talked with the gecko people, they were jerks; the setae they described are about a 10th or maybe a hundredth the diameter; so supposedly they use van der Waal's forces to stick to things. that is a matter of opinion
- Teacher Can you give control to Zach?
Bugscope Team zach has control
- Guest among the small setae, theres a gaint sphere structure, what is that?
Bugscope Team oh sorry we missed it, looks like, at this mag
- Bugscope Team huh what happened?
- Bugscope Team maybe the gecko people are monitoring our communications
- Bugscope Team anterior tentorial pits on either side of the compound eyes
- 1:19pm
- Guest how are you cate?
Bugscope Team im good. Thanks for not leaving me out :)
- Guest is anyone dressed for halloween?
- Guest Me too. Its a lovely floor lamp with a rice paper shade.
- Guest Whats the last kind of lamp you bought Cate?
Bugscope Team haha i think the last lamp I bought was from walmart
- Guest Why are so far underground?
Bugscope Team less vibration, no danger of getting sunlight
- Guest i got a nice 50 dollar lamp that my roommate didnt want anymore
- Bugscope Team I like mites, which are not insects, and I like weevils and earwigs, and also leafhoppers
- Guest Why can't we see the bumps? Does this fly just not have them?
Bugscope Team they are covered with juju except in a few places, like here
- Guest Cate and Scot, what are your favourite insects and why?
Bugscope Team maybe some kind of wasp or bee. They can have pollen on them and their faces and antennae kind of look like a rabbit. Oh and sometimes you can see some rad looking stinger
- Guest How did all of you meet?
- Guest Are there any samples of mites we can look at?
Bugscope Team sorry we did not find any today, yet...
- Guest What on Earth is this?
Bugscope Team pollen grain
- Guest What is juju?
Bugscope Team it's what we call dried fluids, usually, that we do not recognize
Bugscope Team sometimes we will also call dirt or dust particles juju as well. Pretty much anything that isn't native to that insect
- 1:24pm
- Guest cool thanks!
- Guest when i think of the midwest, i think of corn. are you guys close to any cornfields?
Bugscope Team yes
Bugscope Team ha! We are surrounded
- Bugscope Team The university even has its own special cornfields
- Teacher Can you give control to Timfeld
Bugscope Team timfeld has control
- Bugscope Team it has a face like a borer
- Bugscope Team Cate was dressed like a Tim Burton character yesterday.
- Guest Do the engineering students use GPS technology to make really cool corn mazes?
Bugscope Team not sure anyone makes corn mazes around here, not this year with the drought
- Bugscope Team this is cool
- Guest Which character?
Bugscope Team I think a generic one.
- Bugscope Team i wasnt dressed as anyone specifically. Just wearing festive clothing like black and white striped tights, skull and crossbone shoes and an orange halloween shirt
- Bugscope Team yes Dr R what is the critter that looks like a boxer, or a borer?
- Guest What exactly are these setae on the spurs? And spurs are used for what, exactly?
- Teacher I think it is a bark beetles or something like that
- Teacher beetle
- Guest Aside from stunning visuals what kind of information do you collect from SEM micrographs? How do you use it?
Bugscope Team people look at samples they have fabricated, bacteria; we looked at some human epithelial breast cells in Matrigel a few weeks ago; also graphene, boron nitride...
- 1:29pm
- Guest what are the long tenticles behind the spur?
Bugscope Team some of the bristle-like things at leg joints are sensory, like for proprioception
- Teacher HAITONG!
- Guest are there any bumpin parties this weekend?
Bugscope Team I think neither Cate nor I get out that much.
- Bugscope Team this has got to be some kind of cerambycid
- Guest That's okay, none of us science students get out much either.
Bugscope Team we're like what you become after you're a science student
- Guest Scot, that's kind of scary.
Bugscope Team we get to see the very coolest cutting edge stuff. yesterday I got some awesome electron diffraction images of boron nitride that actually proved we were really seeing it
- Bugscope Team i'm an electron microscopist. I usually assist or train users to use the microscopes or other related machines
- Guest Yeah, I guess that makes up for it.
Bugscope Team we are really lucky to have such cool high-end equipment to work with
- 1:34pm
- Bugscope Team I started out as a student worker that helped with verious things around the lab, then when I graduated I got more responsibilities and a full time job
- Guest cate, are you seeing anyone?
Bugscope Team I'm married sorry
- Guest That's true, it's some cool sci-fi stuff, that's for sure. How did you end up working with it?
Bugscope Team one of the groups here does the best ultra high res ultra high vacuum STM in the world, and we are lucky to get to help them sometimes
- Guest Dr. Ray isn't convinced this is a cerambycid because of how long at antennal segment is. Also it's got a wonky prothorax. Any ideas?
Bugscope Team it's the professional thorax that makes it look like a cerambycid
Bugscope Team she is the total pro; we are just, like, microscopists
- Guest Is STM scanning tunneling microscopy? do you also do AFM?
Bugscope Team yes definitely
Bugscope Team yes to both
- Bugscope Team we have microCT, nanoCT, FCS, FLIM, TIRF, multiphoton, Raman, etc.
- 1:39pm
- Guest What is this? Help.
Bugscope Team oh sorry -- it is one of the tarsi of the leafhopper
- Bugscope Team like an arolium on a grasshopper
- Bugscope Team sort of
- Bugscope Team i think it's more of a bend
- Guest what does this hole lead to?
Bugscope Team it's like a catcher's mitt -- it doesn't lead anywhere
- Guest What is this tentacle-like structure?
Bugscope Team probably a mechanosensory seta
Bugscope Team so the leafhopper knows when something is touching its 'palm'
- Guest what about the scales to the side?
Bugscope Team that is the surface of the chitin/cuticle
- Teacher Can you give power to Meaghan?
Bugscope Team meaghan has control
- Bugscope Team Yay! Leafhoppers I really like.
- Bugscope Team so cool
- Bugscope Team it has a blunt proboscis but if you look up close you can see the actual stylet
- Bugscope Team compound eyes streamlined into the head
- Bugscope Team little aristate antennae
- Bugscope Team from France
- 1:44pm
- Guest Has the bugscope ever found any new species of ectoparasites on insects?
Bugscope Team ha Yeah we think so.
Bugscope Team we've seen mites with little eyes, without eyes, with what are clearly polarized eyes, but very likely they have all been well characterized.
- Bugscope Team there's a book about mites available but it is like $170
- Bugscope Team do you think I can justify that to the finance people?
- 1:50pm
- Guest do the halteres sense by air current or gravity or etc.?
Bugscope Team I think they are self sensing, in a way; it could be the Johnston's organ that helps the fly sense that kind of motion, in flight.
Bugscope Team totally speculating
- Bugscope Team this is where a bunch of setae are missing
- Teacher can you give power to kevin, again?
Bugscope Team Kevin is the supreme ruler now
- Bugscope Team deus ex machina
- Bugscope Team I've seen them at the zoo before- a whole fishtank full of them
- 1:55pm
- Guest have you seen dermestedes eating dead bugs before?
Bugscope Team we have found tiny insects living among dead bugs and obviously feeding on them
- Bugscope Team so when we look at brochosomes, which are often 250 to 400 nm in diameter
Bugscope Team we are in the nano realm
- Bugscope Team the way we use the microscope for Bugscope, we are operating at a long working distance and actually sacrificing resolution for the ability to see whole insects at low mag
- Bugscope Team so we are capable of obtaining better resolution; usually is it is not appreciable but with brochosomes it is.
- Guest Is this a spiracle that we're looking at?
Bugscope Team looks like it
- Guest are you interested in brochosomes scot?
Bugscope Team yes because it is the idea that they are so small and also self-assembled, in a way
- Teacher OK--I think we are pretty much finished here...our session time is up.
Bugscope Team awww
- Teacher :(
- Bugscope Team thanks for the great and amusing questions
- Teacher Thank you two, thanks for your good sense of humor!
Bugscope Team Hey Thank You, Annie! And Thank You, Everyone!
- Bugscope Team this was so much fun
- Teacher I miss this!
Bugscope Team yeah we miss having you on as well. I wanted to call all of the insects lobsters, like lobster1, lobster2...
- 2:00pm
- Teacher :)
- Guest thank you scot and cate
Bugscope Team Thank You, Haitong!
- Guest this was a lot of fun! thank you very much!
Bugscope Team Thank you, Nick!
- Guest thank u
Bugscope Team Thank You, Brooke!
- Guest Thank you Cate and Scot!
Bugscope Team Thanks, Chris!
- Guest Thanks Scot and Cate
Bugscope Team Thank you, Kevin!
- Teacher OK guys, over and out on my end. Thanks again!
- Bugscope Team Bye, Annie!
