The Influence of Wingbeat Synchronous Feedback on the Motor Output Systems in Flies

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Abstract
Action potentials have been recorded from fibrillar and from non-fibrillar flight muscles of tethered flying flies (Calliphora erythrocephala and Musca domestica). Analyses of the spike-trains from the fibrillar muscles reveal a clear preference of the spikes to appear at a special phase with respect to the wingbeat cycle. This holds true even in cases of ex­perimentally changed motor output patterns. There seems to be some kind of wingbeat-synchronous feedback which influences the output system phasically. Crosscorrelations between spike-trains from the fibrillar muscles on the one hand and the non-fibrillar muscles on the other give evidence that there are strong interactions between the output producing neurons of both systems with at least one inhibitory pathway.