• Seminars 
  • 2001

Abstract : Most studies on locomotion in crayfish and lobsters have concentrated on pereiopod walking on flat (aquarium) floors. From this, a lot has been learned regarding coordination and control in multi-leg systems, but the role of the pleopods (swimmerets) has hardly been addressed so far. In nature, the substrate that crayfish and lobsters walk on hardly ever compares to a flat aquarium floor and often included lots of obstructions which have to be taken. Our observations indicated that during special locomotory tasks, such as walking up-hill or fast walking, the pleopods are recruited together with the legs. In this presentation, relations between pleopod beat parameters and task parameters will be presented together with pleopod thrust modelling and some prelimenary PIV flow analysis of thrust production. These results indicate that crayfish use pleopod thrust to manoeuver and to support or even take over from the legs as prime locomotory system, when necessary.

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CV : Eize Jan Stamhuis (1959) studied Marine Biology and Biomechanics at the University of Groningen. Before entering the University, he first studied Electronics at the Polytechnic and later Physics and Biology at the Teacher Training College. His PhD was on the behaviour, feeding mechanism and energy budget of the burrowing shrimp Callianassa subterranea. After finishing his thesis in 1997 (cum laude) he did post-doc research on the feeding mechanisms of other marine benthic invertebrates, and was invited to do a one-year research fellowship at the University of Cambridge (UK) mapping the air flow around a robotic insect in 3D. From 1999 onward he is now working as permament staff member of the Dept. of Marine Zoology ar the University of Groningen.