I am setting up a chemical ecology lab at my department and am keen on working on Olfaction on insects. Olfactory coding seemed important and would like to know: What instruments and skills do I need prior to starting up the lab? Any suggestions?
As you may know, there are three importnat components to understand olfactory coding; Behavior, Physiology and Molecular Biology. For behavior in lab you need the olfactometer setups like flight windtunnel, Y-tube, T-maize, open arena etc. For physiological studies the most common techniques used are EAG, GC-EAD, SSR, GC-SSR, Calcium and Optical imaging, Intracellular, GC-MS etc. To study molecular biology the are different molecular instument and techniques are use, but all in all it depends on the availibility of fund and your interest and specialities to decide what is really needed and possible to buy it.
Thanks Muhammad Binyameen its was indeed a useful reply. We have all the instruments mentioned in your reply. The one missing is Calcium and Optical imaging system. Can you or anyone let me know which company deals with this setup? and what may be the tentative cost of this instrument. This details would help me write a project for funds.
That's really great if you have all these instruments. I really have no clue about that, but I'll ask our lab manager and the people using these machines. I'll cme back to you with the required information. Can you please give me your email address for further communication. My email address is [email protected]
I recommend you read articles where talk of the electrical activity of insect antennae with EAG, if you want to deepen the knowledge there is a book: Insect Olfaction. B.S. Hansson ISBN 3-540-65034-2 Springer
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