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Lookup NU author(s): Dr Shoko SugasawaORCiD
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© 2021 The Author(s) Published by the Royal Society. All rights reserved.Our current understanding of manipulation is based on primate hands, resulting in a detailed but narrow perspective of ways to handle objects. Although most other animals lack hands, they are still capable of flexible manipulation of diverse objects, including food and nest materials, and depend on dexterity in object handling to survive and reproduce. Birds, for instance, use their bills and feet to forage and build nests, while insects carry food and construct nests with their mandibles and legs. Bird bills and insect mandibles are much simpler than a primate hand, resembling simple robotic grippers. A better understanding of manipulation in these and other species would provide a broader comparative perspective on the origins of dexterity. Here we contrast data from primates, birds and insects, describing how they sense and grasp objects, and the neural architectures that control manipulation. Finally, we outline techniques for collecting comparable manipulation data from animals with diverse morphologies and describe the practical applications of studying manipulation in a wide range of species, including providing inspiration for novel designs of robotic manipulators.
Author(s): Sugasawa S, Webb B, Healy SD
Publication type: Review
Publication status: Published
Journal: Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences
Year: 2021
Volume: 288
Issue: 1947
Print publication date: 31/03/2021
Online publication date: 17/03/2021
Acceptance date: 22/02/2021
ISSN (print): 0962-8452
ISSN (electronic): 1471-2954
Publisher: Royal Society Publishing
URL: https://doi.org/10.1098/rspb.2020.3184
DOI: 10.1098/rspb.2020.3184
PubMed id: 33726598
