Event:

The remarkable ability of animals to navigate over long distances is at least in part mediated by sensing the Earth’s magnetic field. Behavioral experiments on a large number of taxonomically diverse species support the existence of magnetoreceptive systems, however, the underlying sensorineural structures remain elusive. In the Keays lab we investigate where and how a magnetic stimulus is transduced into a neuronal impulse and how this information is integrated in the central nervous system of pigeons. Employing neuronal activity mapping, whole brain clearing and light sheet microscopy we show that exposing pigeons to rotating magnetic fields leads to increased activity in the brainstem vestibular nuclei, the dorsal thalamus and regions of the mesopallium and hippocampus of pigeons. These experiments provide evidence for a magnetosensory neuronal pathway originating in the pigeon vestibular system. Physical calculations, modeling and molecular ablation studies further support the hypothesis that magnetic fields might be detected by voltage sensitive ion channels in the vestibular system through a process called electromagnetic induction.