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ABSTRACT Visual ecology, the study of how animals acquire and respond to visual information in nature, has grown rapidly over the past few decades. Research in this field has transformed our understanding of fundamental processes, such as the neurobiological basis of behavior and the diversification of species through sensory drive. The recent growth in the field has been accompanied by leaps in our understanding of the diversity of visual systems and in the development of novel technologies and techniques (for example, those allowing us to measure scenes and signals). With such growth, however, it is more important than ever to integrate wide perspectives and expertise to move the field forward in the most productive way. To that end, in summer 2024, 30 visual ecologists from around the world – spanning all career stages – met to discuss the state of the field. From that meeting, we identified two broad emerging themes in the study of visual ecology. (1) Can we further ‘step inside’ the perceptual experience of a non-human animal? (2) Can foundational ‘rules’ of vision and visual stimuli be identified? Although large questions such as these can feel unanswerable, this is where some of the most exciting discoveries in visual ecology remain to be made. Here, we outline eight relevant areas of research and identify ways in which researchers can bring us closer to answering these complex questions. 

ABSTRACT Wing integrity is crucial to the many insect species that spend distinct portions of their life in flight. How insects cope with the consequences of wing damage is therefore a central question when studying how robust flight performance is possible with such fragile chitinous wings. It has been shown in a variety of insect species that the loss in lift-force production resulting from wing damage is generally compensated by an increase in wing beat frequency rather than amplitude. The consequences of wing damage for flight performance, however, are less well understood, and vary considerably between species and behavioural tasks. One hypothesis reconciling the varying results is that wing damage might affect fast flight manoeuvres with high acceleration, but not slower ones. To test this hypothesis, we investigated the effect of wing damage on the manoeuvrability of hummingbird hawkmoths (Macroglossum stellatarum) tracking a motorised flower. This assay allowed us to sample a range of movements at different temporal frequencies, and thus assess whether wing damage affected faster or slower flight manoeuvres. We show that hummingbird hawkmoths compensate for the loss in lift force mainly by increasing wing beat amplitude, yet with a significant contribution of wing beat frequency. We did not observe any effects of wing damage on flight manoeuvrability at either high or low temporal frequencies. 

The retina has a very high energy demand but lacks an internal blood supply in most vertebrates. Here we explore the hypothesis that oxygen diffusion limited the evolution of retinal morphology by reconstructing the evolution of retinal thickness and the various mechanisms for retinal oxygen supply, including capillarization and acid-induced haemoglobin oxygen unloading. We show that a common ancestor of bony fishes likely had a thin retina without additional retinal oxygen supply mechanisms and that three different types of retinal capillaries were gained and lost independently multiple times during the radiation of vertebrates, and that these were invariably associated with parallel changes in retinal thickness. Since retinal thickness confers multiple advantages to vision, we propose that insufficient retinal oxygen supply constrained the functional evolution of the eye in early vertebrates, and that recurrent origins of additional retinal oxygen supply mechanisms facilitated the phenotypic evolution of improved functional eye morphology.