POSTER PRESENTATION Open Access Detecting vibration source for the orientation behavior of sand scorpions

Sand scorpions can locate their prey through their vibra-tion sensitivity. They have their tactile sense organs on their legs to detect vibration reaching their body. They show an orientation behavior towards their prey when there is any vibration signal generated by prey movement. How they respond to the vibration source is an open ques-tion. It is believed that stimulus-locked neuron firings from the sensor organs on each leg are processed and the brain system of sand scorpions has sensory projections from the sense organs. It is known that eight command neurons in the brain interact each other with triad inhibi-tions [1,2]. Then a population coding of the neuron activ-ity determines the direction of vibration source [3]. We tested direction selectivity in the sand with an experimental setup to detect the vibration source as shown in Figure 1. Eight legs of sand scorpions are posi-tioned almost in a rim of circle. We placed eight micro-phones in a circle and each microphone sensor detects the vibration signal. The positions of microphone sensors are similar to the foot positions of sand scorpions, that is, th