Wallace Coffee Talks - 12 April 2018

Wallace Coffee Talks - Spring 2018
12 April 2018 - 1pm - Zoology Museum

Daniel Strömbom (Swansea University, UK)

Mechanistic modelling of collective motion in animal groups

Bird flocks, fish schools, and herds of sheep being chased by sheepdogs are examples of systems that consists of many individuals that can somehow move and respond to external stimuli as one unit. How does that work? In this talk I will present some standard “answers” to this question, some recent results suggesting we may want to revise these “answers", and explain how work of this type may be useful to society.

Ana Carolina Luchiari (Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Norte, Brazil)

Fish like us: how can fish help us to understand ourselves

I am a biologist and developed my MSc and PhD to answer how different environmental colors affect behavior and welfare in fish. For the past five years, I have been concerned with the development of novel behavioral testing tools (face validity) for the zebrafish, and with psychopharmacological approaches to study the mechanisms of alcohol abuse, and its effects on learning and memory (constructive and predictive validities). All psychoactive drugs are of interest when it can positively or negatively affect our brain. Currently, I am trying to understand individual differences in alcohol intake, transgenerational effects of alcohol on cognition, and the potential of alternative treatments for alcohol abuse.