Random Walk Revisited: Quantification and Comparative Analysis of Drosophila Walking Trajectories

Walking trajectory is frequently measured to assess animal behavior. Air-supported spherical treadmills have been developed for real-time monitoring of animal walking trajectories. However, current systems for mice mainly employ computer mouse microcameras (chip-on-board sensors) to monitor ball motion, and these detectors exhibit technical issues with focus and rotation scale. In addition, computational methods to analyze and quantify the “random walk” of organisms are under-developed. In this work, we overcame the hurdle of frame-to-signal translation to develop a treadmill system with camera-based detection. Moreover, we generated a package of mathematical methods to quantify distinct aspects of Drosophila walking trajectories. By extracting and quantifying certain features of walking dynamics with high temporal resolution, we found that depending on their internal state, flies employ different walking strategies to approach environmental cues. This camera-based treadmill system and method package may also be applicable to monitor the walking trajectories of other diverse animal species.