Contact Information
320 Morrill Hall
505 S. Goodwin
Urbana, IL 61801
Research Description
Physiological basis of insect behavior
Delcomyn is concerned with the neural mechanisms that enable an animal to generate, coordinate, and control the individual movements that together comprise behavior. He has chosen the locomotion of insects as a model behavior in part because neural programs of motor activity are strongly influenced by sensory input in insects. He uses physiological techniques, computer simulation, and robotic engineering to model the insect locomotor system and to test hypotheses about how motor programs are generated and how they are influenced by sensory feedback.
Education
B.S. (Biology) Wayne State University
M.S. (Biology) Northwestern University
Ph.D. (Biology) University of Oregon
Awards and Honors
U.S. Public Health Service Postdoctoral Fellow, University of Oregon, March - September 1969
Summer Faculty Fellow, University of Illinois, Urbana, June - August 1973
Fellow, American Association for the Advancement of Science (elected May, 1983)
Biographee in "Who's Who in Frontiers of Science and Technology" published by Marquis Who's Who, Inc. (Since 1986.)
Biographee in "Who's Who in the MidWest" Published by Marquis Who's Who, Inc. (Since 1986.)
Senior Fulbright Scholar, Federal Republic of Germany, 1987 - 1988
Additional Campus Affiliations
School of Integrative Biology
External Links
Recent Publications
Delcomyn, F., & Ellis, J. L. (2021). A Backyard Prairie: The Hidden Beauty of Tallgrass and Wildflowers. Southern Illinois University Press.
Delcomyn, F. (2009). Walking in invertebrates. In Encyclopedia of Neuroscience (pp. 479-484). Elsevier Ltd. https://doi.org/10.1016/B978-008045046-9.01977-X
Delcomyn, F. (2008). From insect sense organs to biomimetic walking robots. IEEE Signal Processing Magazine, 25(1), 134-137. https://doi.org/10.1109/MSP.2008.4408450
Delcomyn, F. (2004). Insect Walking and Robotics. Annual Review of Entomology, 49, 51-70. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev.ento.49.061802.123257
Fan, Z., Chen, J., Zou, J., Bullen, D., Liu, C., & Delcomyn, F. (2002). Design and fabrication of artificial lateral line flow sensors. Journal of Micromechanics and Microengineering, 12(5), 655-661. https://doi.org/10.1088/0960-1317/12/5/322