.... Texture discrimination sensitivity and associated tactile strategies in these marsupials show behavioral plasticity, which is dependent on sensory inputs available during development. Active touch sensing Compensatory plasticity Short-tailed opossum Texture Vibrissae The behavioral...

...Yvonne Krüger; Wolf Hanke; Lars Miersch; Guido Dehnhardt ABSTRACT Harbour seals possess highly sensitive vibrissae that enable them to track hydrodynamic trails left behind by a swimming fish. Most of these trails contain vortex rings as a main hydrodynamic component. They may reveal information...

... , M. , Miersch , L. , Brede , M. , Oeffner , J. , Michael , M. , Hanke , F. , Leder , A. and Dehnhardt , G. ( 2010 ). Harbor seal vibrissa morphology suppresses vortex-induced vibrations . J. Exp. Biol.   213 , 2665 - 2672 . 10.1242/jeb.043216 Hughes , G. M...

... and the blindfold by the assistant, and then was cued to rest his lower jaw on a contoured chin rest. In this stationing position, the vibrissae on his right muzzle touched the surface of the contact plate, as shown in Fig. 4 . He was able to flex his vibrissae forward to obtain firmer contact with the plate...

...Robyn A. Grant; Sebastian Haidarliu; Natalie J. Kennerley; Tony J. Prescott SUMMARY Facial vibrissae, or whiskers, are found in nearly all extant mammal species and are likely to have been present in early mammalian ancestors. A sub-set of modern mammals, including many rodents, move their long...

...Sven Wieskotten; Björn Mauck; Lars Miersch; Guido Dehnhardt; Wolf Hanke SUMMARY Harbour seals can use their mystacial vibrissae to detect and track hydrodynamic wakes. We investigated the ability of a harbour seal to discriminate objects of different size or shape by their hydrodynamic signature...

...S. Wieskotten; G. Dehnhardt; B. Mauck; L. Miersch; W. Hanke SUMMARY The mystacial vibrissae of harbour seals ( Phoca vitulina ) constitute a highly sensitive hydrodynamic receptor system enabling the seals to detect and follow hydrodynamic trails. In the wild, hydrodynamic trails, as generated...

...Wolf Hanke; Matthias Witte; Lars Miersch; Martin Brede; Johannes Oeffner; Mark Michael; Frederike Hanke; Alfred Leder; Guido Dehnhardt SUMMARY Harbor seals ( Phoca vitulina ) often live in dark and turbid waters, where their mystacial vibrissae, or whiskers, play an important role in orientation...

... in the hydrodynamic trail and high water velocities between two counter-rotating vortices are characteristic of the movement direction and are within the sensory range of the seal. * Author for correspondence ( [email protected] ) 30 3 2010 © 2010. 2010 harbour seal vibrissae...

...N. Schulte-Pelkum; S. Wieskotten; W. Hanke; G. Dehnhardt; B. Mauck SUMMARY For seals hunting in dark and murky waters one source of sensory information for locating prey consists of fish-generated water movements,which they can detect using their highly sensitive mystacial vibrissae. As water...

...G. Dehnhardt; B. Mauck; H. Hyvärinen ABSTRACT Vibrissae provide pinnipeds with tactile information primarily in the aquatic environment, which is characterized by its high thermal conductivity and large potential cooling power. Since studies of thermal effects on human tactile sensitivity have...

...G. Dehnhardt; A. Kaminski ABSTRACT We studied the capability of one male and one female harbour seal Phoca vitulina to discriminate diameter differences of circular discs by means of active touch with their mystacial vibrissae. To prevent the animals from perceiving visual information, they were...