Jakarta –
Even though they don’t have brains, jellyfish are apparently able to learn from past experiences like humans, mice and flies. Caribbean box jellyfish (Tripedalia cystophora) it uses its experience to detect and overcome obstacles.
The findings of researcher Jan Bielecki and colleagues were reported in the journal Current Biology recently.
“Learning is the peak performance of the nervous system,” said Bielecki from Kiel University, Germany, quoted from the page Science Daily.
To teach jellyfish new tricks, Bielecki says the best way is to take advantage of their natural behavior. According to his team, teaching steps that are appropriate to the jellyfish’s behavior help these animals reach their potential by learning from experience.
Jellyfish Learn from Experience
Jellyfish don’t have brains, they still have a simple nervous system. This animal is considered to be one of the earliest animals on Earth to develop and have a nervous system. Research shows that jellyfish managed to avoid collisions through visual and mechanical stimulation in the form of impacts on their nerves after several collisions with the walls of the test tank.
To reach this conclusion, the research team designed a round aquarium tank with gray and white stripes. These lines create an imitation of mangrove roots from a distance, which would appear in the jellyfish’s natural habitat.
The jellyfish initially swam close to the lines, but hit the aquarium wall because it thought the ‘mangrove roots’ were still far away. In the 7.5 minute test, the jellyfish was able to avoid a collision by taking a distance of about 50 percent from the aquarium wall at the end of the experiment.
“Looking at the relatively simple nervous system of jellyfish, we have a greater chance of understanding all the details and how they behave,” said Anders Garm from the University of Copenhagen, Denmark.
“It’s surprising how quickly these animals learn; the speed is almost the same as the learning speed of complex animals,” he continued.
Garm explains that even the simplest nervous systems seem capable of advanced learning. This suggests that there may have been very fundamental cellular mechanisms early in the evolution of the nervous system.
This research team plans to find out how this simple animal can form brainless memory by studying the interactions of the jellyfish’s nervous system at the cellular level in the future. The hope is that humans can better understand how mechanical sensors in nerve cells work, so that animals can learn associatively even though they don’t have brains.
Watch the video “29 Parangtritis Beach Tourists Stung by Blue Jellyfish”
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2023-09-24 12:30:00
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