A researcher studying how amphibious creatures communicate was able to trick frog dads, but the moms were not fooled.
When Billie Goolsby, who is hard of hearing, told her chemistry professor at Boston University that she wanted to pursue science, she was told that "people like you don't stay in science or medicine." Thankfully, the school's Deaf Studies program introduced her to deaf and hard-of-hearing faculty members who insisted that no career was out of her reach, she told Nature.
Now, a PhD student, Goolsby, drawing on her own experience of communicating via touch, wanted to decode the underwater communication between frogs and their young. Stanford's Biomimetics and Dexterous Manipulation Laboratory created TadBot for the study.
The tiny robot tadpole, covered in grey silicone, wiggled, mimicking a "begging dance." The frog dads, seeing the dance, "… sang to their partners after they felt its vibrating signals," calling them to deliver a meal. However, when the mom frogs arrived, they did not release a "snack egg," the unfertilized eggs used to feed the tadpoles. Goolsby speculates that an additional sensory cue is required for the moms to release an egg. The question will be left to other researchers, as Goosby and Tony Chen, the designer of TadBot, have both moved on to other projects.
Previously:
• Absolutely astonishing video of a single cell becoming a tadpole
• Get rich farming frogs, 1934
• Scientists discover transparent frog
