This game is inspired by the September 2026 publication of the complete male fruit-fly (Drosophila melanogaster) central nervous system connectome, mapping all 166,000+ neurons and tens of millions of synaptic connections.
Neuron-to-Muscle Synaptic Latencies
• Giant Fiber → TTM (Jump Muscle): ~0.8 ms (direct electrical synapse)
• Giant Fiber → DLM (Flight Muscle): ~1.2 ms (disynaptic pathway)
Neuron-to-Muscle vs. Full Visual Escape:
Direct electrical stimulation of the Giant Fiber triggers muscle contraction in under 2 ms. However, the full behavioral response from seeing a looming shadow (visual expansion) to jumping takes longer (~30–100 ms) because specialized looming detector neurons (such as LC4 and LPLC2) in the visual system must first integrate the incoming visual stimulus before firing the Giant Fibers (DNp01).
Scientific Citations
1. Connectome: Berg, Beckett et al., Cell (Sept 2026) — "Sexual dimorphism in the complete Drosophila male central nervous system connectome"
2. Electrophysiology: Tanouye & Wyman (1980) / Allen et al. (2006) — Drosophila Giant Fiber escape reflex circuit