Conditioning planaria : device design based on an autonomous, large-scale parallel approach

Current behavioral research is conducted on planaria that have been conditioned manually, one at a time by a person. In an attempt to instrument at an organism level, a design for an environment that automatically conditions multiple planaria in parallel was produced. This design consisted of a testing chamber that could stimulate the planaria using electrical shock and light. A computer program was also written to automatically record the results of the experiments for later analysis by researchers. This design was tested and the results were inconclusive based on technical issues with the experimental procedure. Further research is necessary to determine the validity of this device's ability to condition planaria.

Department dc:contributor.department

Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Dept. of Mechanical Engineering.

Grantor dc:publisher

Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Year dc:date.issued

2004

Author dc:creator

• Wendell, Dawn M. (Dawn Marie), 1983-

Advisor dc:contributor.advisor

• Ian W. Hunter.

• Mechanical Engineering.

Statement dc:rights

• M.I.T. theses are protected by copyright. They may be viewed from this source for any purpose, but reproduction or distribution in any format is prohibited without written permission. See provided URL for inquiries about permission.

Licence dc:rights.uri

• http://dspace.mit.edu/handle/1721.1/7582

Language dc:language.iso

eng

Handle dc:identifier.uri

http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/32795

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:dspace.mit.edu:1721.1/32795