article strains

The name of the directory gives the number and the strain of fish used during the experiment. Cylinder and disks gives the spots of interest used for the experiments. In the files, data are developped as: time step (first column) then x position of fish 1 (fish0x) then y position of fish 1 (fish0y) then x position of fish 2 (fish1x) then y position of fish 2 (fish1y) then ..

One file: Supplementary figures of “Strain differences in the collective behaviour of zebrafish (Danio rerio) in heterogeneous environment”.

Recent studies show differences in individual motion and shoaling tendency between strains of the same species. Here, we analyse collective motion and response to visual stimuli in two morphologically different strains (TL and AB) of zebrafish. For both strains, we observed 10 groups of 5 and 10 zebrafish swimming freely in a large experimental tank with two identical landmarks (cylinders or discs) for 1 h. We tracked the positions of the fish by an automated tracking method and compute several metrics at the group level. First, the probability of the presence shows that both strains avoid free space and are more likely to swim in the vicinity of the walls of the tank and the landmarks. Second, the analysis of landmarks occupancy shows that AB zebrafish are more present in their vicinity than TL ones and that both strains regularly transit from one to the other one with no preference on the long duration. Finally, TL zebrafish show a higher cohesion than AB zebrafish. Thus, environmental heterogeneity and duration of the trials allow to reveal individual and collective behavioural variabilities among different strains of zebrafish. These results provide a new insight into the need to take into account individual variability of zebrafish strains for studying collective behaviour

Simulation Data

Raw data for the modeling simulations for each of the four species (European Starling, Red-winged Blackbird, Golden Shiner and Zebrafish)

Estimation of species parameters/Detailed results of modeling exercises/Comparison of visual parameters with empirical findings from Collective behaviour in vertebrates: a sensory perspective

Collective behaviour models can predict behaviours of schools, flocks, herds, etc. However, in many cases, these models make biologically unrealistic assumptions in terms of the sensory capabilities of the organism, which are applied across different species. We explored how sensitive collective behaviour models are to these sensory assumptions. Specifically, we used parameters reflecting the visual coverage and visual acuity that determine the spatial range over which an individual can detect and interact with conspecifics. Using metric and topological collective behaviour models, we compared the classic sensory parameters, typically used to model birds and fish, with a set of realistic sensory parameters obtained through physiological measurements. Compared with the classic sensory assumptions, the realistic assumptions increased perceptual ranges, which led to fewer groups and larger group sizes in all species, and higher polarity values and slightly shorter neighbour distances in the fish species. Overall, classic visual sensory assumptions are not representative of many species showing collective behaviour and constrain unrealistically their perceptual ranges. More importantly, caution must be exercised when empirically testing the predictions of these models in terms of choosing the model species, making realistic predictions, and interpreting the results