Report by Aarya Krishnan
Scientists in Israel have done something truly unusual- they taught a goldfish to drive a small robotic car on land!
The experiment was carried out by researchers at the Ben-Gurion University of the Negev in Israel. They wanted to see if goldfish’s ability to find their way is based on their environment or not, and turns out, goldfish can navigate their way on dry land.
To make this experiment, the researchers create a special robotic car that could drive left, right, forward and backward. The name given to this is car is “Fish Operated Vehicle” or FOV for short.
How this worked
A goldfish was put inside a water tank on top of the FOV and a system inside the car tracked the direction it swam in and would automatically swim in that direction.
The scientists used six different goldfish as test subjects.
They tested them by placing the car in a small room with a pink target on one side. The fish were given a food pellet when the car touched the target.
On the first try, it took the fish half an hour to reach the target but at the end of the experiment they completed the same challenge in under a minute.
To make things more difficult, the researchers placed fake targets with other colours to fool the fish.
The fish not only reached the target but also managed to get themselves unstuck when hitting a wall!
Click here to view the full video released by the University.
Image Credits: The Ben Gurion University