Mind controlling parasitism is maybe one of the coolest things in neuroscience to me.

So lots of insects and birds and other animals can sense the polarization of light, not just the wavelength and intensity like we can. Its a super important navigational, predation, and potentially even social sense: the atmosphere and surface of water emit/reflect polarized light, different surfaces/shells influence polarization, etc. Animals sense polarization with special rhabdomeric photoreceptors that are like little oriented combs. Some ppl speculate (havent kept up on this lit) that camouflaging species like cephalopods can actively manipulate polarization as a social/communicative medium.

So this parasite that breeds in water gets the mantis host that it drives to go to the water by influencing its perception of polarized light, making it more appealing in some way. This was just a behavioral study, not sure if they've followed it up to see if the parasite influences the photoreceptors directly or affect downstream perception.

I wonder what the perceptual reality is like... to suddenly need to go towards polarized light.

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cub.2021.05.001

#neuroscience #vision #photoreception #photoreceptors #parasitism