Predator behaviour was the focus of Christos’s PhD and remains a big part of the group’s interests. Aspects of predator behaviour that we’re interested in are those that affect social behaviour in prey, and also other traits like how cryptic prey are.
The experimental approaches taken at Leeds with real prey like Daphnia and bloodworms were advanced massively when virtual prey in Princeton were developed (see video). Now we use a combination of both approaches, and we’re developing a robotic prey system to take things even further!
Collaborators:
Dr. James Herbert-Read, University of Cambridge
Prof. Innes Cuthill, University of Bristol
Check out our virtual prey system (from our 2019 PNAS paper):