John E. Layne

SBBE, Behavioral neurobiology and sensory ecology; vision in natural habitats; control systems in visual guidance; animal orientation and navigation

B.A.: Macalester College St. Paul, MN, 1991 (Biology)

Ph.D.: Duke University Durham, NC, 1998 (Zoology)

I am a Neuroethologist.  My research aims to discover how sense organs, and the neural processing of sensory information, mediate and constrain animal behavior under natural conditions.  Sense organs both make possible a given behavior, and also limit its range of capacity.  By spanning neural, sensory and behavioral fields I operate at an intersection of several biological, psychological and engineering disciplines.  This allows collaborations that extend the competencies of the investigators involved – an exceedingly and increasingly important factor in the progress, and funding, of complex biological research – and also extend bridges of understanding between all-too-frequently insular disciplines.  My research program consists of two major projects:
1.  Mechanisms of navigation by path integration.  I study the navigational process of path integration in fiddler crabs, which are the ideal subject for three reasons.  First, unlike other animals, they regularly walk in virtually any direction relative to their body axis.  This means that in sensation, measurement and computation they must deal with three, rather than two, degrees of terrestrial locomotory freedom (direction, distance and turns, rather than merely the latter two).  Second, they are the only animals known to primarily, and possibly exclusively, use idiothetic path integration for homing.  This means that they are a model system for investigating a real biological manifestation of the worst possible mode of navigation.  Third, they have highly developed stabilizing eye movements, which operate much like those in humans.  This means that the role of eye movements in the sense of navigational space is best studied in, and generalized from, these animals.
2. Optical and physiological adaptations of retina to environment.  I relate animals’ visual morphology and physiology to their behavior and the structure of their natural habitats.  The goal is to understand the way natural stimuli are perceived, and to understand the evolutionary adaptation of sense organs with respect to the behaviors they mediate.  This research follows the trail of information vertically through different levels of biological organization: from the spatial structure of light in an animal’s habitat, to the gross anatomy of its eyes, to the sensory cells’ physiological responses to light, to the higher-order cells’ filtering and computational properties.  What binds all of these things together is the behavior of the animal itself.
See more about Animal Behavior at UC.

Grant: #IOS-1456932 2015 -2019 NSF Sensory Physiology and Genomics of Olfaction in Drosophila mojavensis Role:Co-PI (S. Rollmann) $680,000.00

Grant: #DRL-1759150 2018 -2021 NSF Strategies: Trans-disciplinary Education in Biology and Engineering Technology Role:Co-PI (S. Rollmann) $1,198,120.00

Grant: #DBI-2050772 2021 -2024 NSF REU Site: Sensory Ecology: An Integrative Approach Role:Co-PI (S. Rollmann) $308,201.00

Grant: #DRL-2342578 2024 -2029 NSF ITEST SEI: Biology Meets Engineering, Expanding Trans-disciplinary STEM Education Role:Co-PI (S. Rollmann) $3,496,642.00

Peer Reviewed Publications

Maksimovic, S., Layne, J. E. and Buschbeck, E. K.  (2011). The spectral sensitivity of the principal eyes of the Sunburst Diving Beetle Thermonectus marmoratus (Coleoptera: Dytiscidae) larva.  Journal of Experimental Biology 214: 3524-3531

Stowasser, A., Rapaport, A.†, Layne, J. E., Morgan, R. C. and Buschbeck, E. K. (2010) Biological bifocal lenses with image separation.  Current Biology 20: 1482-1486.

Rajkumar, P., Rollmann, S. M., Cook, T. A. and Layne, J.E. (2010).  Molecular evidence for color discrimination in the Atlantic sand fiddler crab, Uca pugilator.  Journal of Experimental Biology 213: 4240-4248.

Walls, M.L & Layne, J.E. (2009). Direct Evidence for Distance Measurement via Flexible Stride Integration in the Fiddler Crab. Current Biology, 19, 1-5.

Walls, M. L. & Layne, J. E. (2009). Fiddler crabs accurately measure two-dimensional distance over three-dimensional terrain. Journal of Experimental Biology, 212, 32363240.

Maksimovic, S., Layne, J.E. & Buschbeck, E.K. (2007). Behavioral evidence for within-eyelet resolution in twisted-winged insects (Strepsiptera). Journal of Experimental Biology, 210, 2819-2828.

Layne, J.E., Chen, P.W. & Gilbert, C. (2006). The role of target elevation in prey selection by tiger beetles (Carabidae : Cicindela spp.). Journal of Experimental Biology, 209 (21), 4295-4303.

Layne, J.E., Barnes, W.J.P. & Duncan, L.M.J. (2003). Mechanisms of homing in the fiddler crab Uca rapax 1. Spatial and temporal characteristics of a system of small-scale navigation. Journal of Experimental Biology, 206 (24), 4413, 4423.

Layne, J.E., Barnes, W.J.P. & Duncan, L.M.J. (2003). Mechanisms of homing in the fiddler crab Uca rapax 2. Information sources and frame of reference for a path integration system. Journal of Experimental Biology, 206 (24), 4425, 4442.

Zeil, J. & J. E. Layne (2002). Path integration in fiddler crabs and its relation to habitat and social life. In K. Wiese (Eds.), Crustacean Experimental Systems in Neurobiology (pp. 227-246). Berlin, Heidelberg, New York: Springer Verlag.

Layne, J.E., Land, M.F. & J. Zeil, J. (1997). Fiddler crabs use the visual horizon to distinguish predators from conspecifics: A review of the evidence. Journal of the Marine Biological Association of the UK, 77, 43-54.

Land, M.F. & Layne, J.E. (1995). The Visual Control of Behavior in Fiddler Crabs. I. Resolution, Thresholds and the Role of the Horizon. Journal of Comparative Physiology A, 177, 81-90.

Land, M.F. & Layne, J.E. (1995). The Visual Control of Behavior in Fiddler Crabs. II. Tracking Control Systems in Courtship and Defence. Journal of Comparative Physiology A, 177, 91-103.

Brown, E. B., Layne, J. E., Zhu, C., Jegga, A. G., Rollmann, S. M. (2013) Genome-wide association mapping of natural variation in odor-guided behavior in Drosophila. Genes, Brain and Behaviour 12: 503-515.

Crowley-Gall, A., Date, P., Han, C., Rhodes, N.†, Andolfatto, P., Layne, J. E. and Rollmann, S. M. (2016) Population differences in olfaction accompany host shift in Drosophila mojavensis.  Proceedings of the Royal Society B. 283: 20161562

Nemeth, D. C., Ammagarahalli, B., Layne, J. E. and Rollmann, S. M. (2018) Evolution of coeloconic sensilla in the peripheral olfactory system of Drosophila mojavensis. Journal of Insect Physiology. 110: 13-23

Brown, E. B., Layne, J. E., Elchert, A.† and Rollmann, S. M. (2020) Behavioral and transcriptional response to selection for olfactory behavior in Drosophila. G3: Genes, Genomes, Genetics 10: 1283-1296

Didion, J. E., Smith, K.† and Layne, J. E. (2020) Modifying twisted nematic LCD screens to create dichromatic visual stimuli with LEDs. Methods in Ecology and Evolution. 11:690-696

Ammagarahalli, B., Layne, J. E. and Rollmann, S. M. (2021) Host plant shift differentially alters olfactory sensitivity in female and male Drosophila mojavensis. Journal of Insect Physiology 135, 104312

DeJarnette, A. F., Larrison, C., Rollman, S. M., Vanderelst, D., Layne, J. E., Hutchinson (2022) Students’ use of computational thinking practices in an undergraduate biology-engineering course. Journal of STEM Education Research

DeJarnette, A. F., Rollmann, S. M., Vanderelst, D. F., Layne, J. E. (2023) Coordinated activity and common ground during group problem solving in biology. Learning, Culture and Social Interaction 43

Chatterji, R.; Layne, J. E. (2023) Eye Movement Reflexes Indicate the Homing Direction in the Path-Integrating Fiddler Crab, Uca pugilator. Journal of Marine Science and Engineering 11, 1719

DeJarnette, A. F., Rollmann, S. M., Vanderelst, D. F., Layne, J. E. and Hutchinson, A. (2024) Sensing in Animals and Robots: Collaborative, Transdisciplinary Learning in an Undergraduate Science Course. Journal of College Science Teaching, 53:2, 140-146

Chatterji, R. and Layne, J. E. (2024) Spatiotemporal structure of foraging and path integration errors by fiddler crabs, Leptuca pugilator. Frontiers in Marine Science - Marine Biology. 11

Rathore, S., Mitra,A., Hyland-Brown, R., Jester, A., Layne, J. E., Benoit, J. B., Buschbeck, E. K. (2024) Osmosis as nature’s method for establishing optical alignment. Current Biology 34: 7, 1569-1575.e3

Layne, J. E. (1998) Retinal location is the key to identifying predators in fiddler crabs (Uca pugilator).  Journal of Experimental Biology 201: 2253-2261

Layne, J. E., Wicklein, M., Dodge, F. A. and Barlow, R. B. (1997) Prediction of maximum allowable retinal slip speed in Uca pugilator.  Biological Bulletin 193: 202-203

1997 Grass Fellowship in Neurobiology

University Research Council

2003-2005 Research Associate, Cornell University, , Ithaca, NY

2000-2002 Post-doctoral fellow, Cornell University, , Ithaca, NY

1998-2000 NSF International Research Fellow, University of Glasgow, , Glasgow, U.K.

1996 Neural Systems and Behavior, Marine Biological Laboratory, , Woods Hole, MA

Sensory Physiology Level:Both

Neurobiology Level:Undergraduate

Animal Behavior Mechanisms Level:Graduate

Academic - University of Cincinnati
Cincinnati  Ohio, Phone: 513.556.9718
john.layne@uc.edu