The University of Bristol's Senses and Sensations research group is delighted to announce an exciting public lecture delivered by two academics working to examine animal senses in different ways and from different angles. In this event, Mark Paterson – who is currently a Benjamin Meaker visiting professor at the University of Bristol – will explore the histories of experiments on animals to understand the sense of touch. These ideas will be placed in conversation with the work of Nathan Morehouse (University of Cincinnati) and his own examinations of animal senses, in which he focuses on vision in spiders. Thinking across different senses, species, times and places, the work of these two scholars will illuminate our understanding of the senses by drawing our attention away from our human selves, and towards those who sense very differently.

The Evolution of Looking and Seeing: New Insights from Colorful Jumping Spiders, Nathan Morehouse, Director IRiS, University of Cincinnati

Insects and spiders face an important challenge: their lifestyles often rely heavily on vision and yet their small size imposes severe spatial constraints on their visual systems. As a result, these tiny animals offer a number of inventive solutions for miniaturized visual sensing, with jumping spiders arguably at the apex. In this seminar, Dr. Morehouse will highlight his recent work to understand how jumping spiders see the world, how these visual capabilities have evolved over time, and how their unusual visual systems have shaped the ways that they communicate with each other.

The discovery of a whole new touch system in frogs, cats, primates … and humans?, Mark Paterson, University of Bristol Benjamin Meaker Visiting Professor, University of Pittsburgh

Pioneering experiments on frogs and cats from the 1920s in Cambridge and then Stockholm found unusual nerve fibres that responded to tickle, temperature, touch and pain. But these nerves acted differently, and much more slowly, than other sensory nerves in these animals. A new class of nerve fibres known as C afferents had been discovered, and opened up what seemed to be a distinct new pathway for touch which responded to slow contact at body temperature. Further experiments found them in other mammals, including primates. But it wasn’t until the 1990s that their presence was confirmed in humans. Since that time a slow revolution has been underway in the way we think about ‘slow’ or affective touch and its relationship to stress and bonding behaviours and hormone release. Come find out more about the world of touch that we share across species, and get a free hug voucher.

Join via Zoom: https://bristol-ac-uk.zoom.us/j/4460929535?pwd=VUp4WERwdis1ek50cXRsNGE4QlgxUT09