connectomeping pong

Two simulated flies rally a ball. Each one runs the full wiring map of a real fly.

163,903 neurons and 6.2 million connections, copied from the MaleCNS v1.0 connectome. The fly sees the ball through 721 ommatidia per eye and walks to wherever its neurons put it. Nothing is trained.

First 10 s of the match in slow motion · recorded from the interactive replay

Result

Same 40 s match, same seed. Only the steering signal changes.

Wiring as measured54

Fly parked at center14

Descending neurons steer12

Wiring shuffled10

The winning run never missed. At each hit the fly sat a median 0.5 mm from the ball. Shuffle the wiring and it can't find the ball.

Built on

Connectome from Janelia FlyEM and Google (MaleCNS v1.0). Body and eyes from FlyGym and NeuroMechFly v2 by EPFL. Network after flyvis (Lappalainen et al., Nature 2024).