Over the weekend I started to make my bat / rat detector. I made a few mistakes like soldering the wrong components into the board but fortunately I had ordered extras so I didn't have to give up when this happened! It was fairly easy to melt the solder again and remove the wrong components. I just hope that I haven't overheated any components while soldering, some had 8 contact points through the board and I was pretty slow at soldering, and metal conducts heat very well. If I have runied some components, I hope I have enough spares to do them again.
All I need to do now is connect the headphone jack and mount the circuitry into the case. I used a dremel to drill holes into the case for the headphone jack and the ultrasonic transducer / microphone.
This is the printed circuit board that I used. In this picture I've already added two [small components].
This picture is showing the soldeing process. You stick the 'prongs' of the component through the cirucit board and then use the soldering iron to heat the area around the component and then melt the solder onto the area.
Here is the board with nearly all of the components added. [list them]
Here is the back of the board which shows the soldering.
Here is the case with the circuitry in place. I drilled holes in the case using a dremel for the headphone jack and the transducer.
This video is what first inspired me to look into listening to rats ultrasonic vocalisations.
It has now been proven that rats laugh. We cannot normally hear this though, as it is at a high ultrasonic frequency of around 50 kHz. Younger rats seem to be more susceptible to laughing, and they are generally more playful than older rats. It also seems that some rats are more playful and ticklish than others. The rats who enjoyed tickling would also seek out the human hands which had tickled them in the past. They also laughed less when around the smell of a cat, when too hungry, or around bright lights (rats prefer dim lights). In adults, it also seems that females prefer tickling to males, and that it is difficult for an adult rat who has never been tickled to start enjoying the behaviour. When young rats get to choose between adults, they prefer to spend time with the adult who 'laughs' more.
It seems that rats laughter is distinct from their other ultrasonic vocalisations. They talk to each other, and only sometimes do we hear these vocalisations - for example when play fighting. By using a piece of equipment to listen to their usually unheard noises we can find out more about them.
In the paper called "Tickling-induced 50-kHz ultrasonic vocalization is individually stable " by Mallo et al. they mention that they studied low frequency vocalisations of rats:
and predicts behaviour in tests of anxiety and depression in rats
"We also studied the emission of low-frequency USVs in the
range of 20-kHz, that have long been associated with negative
events and stimuli and 50-kHz USVs and hence the emotional messages they carry
are mutually exclusive or not, the associations between the two
types of USVs were assessed, and no correlations were found."
This shows that rats also have lower frequency vocalisations which are different to their higher frequency ones, and carry different meanings.
The main character will be a cat, and you will be able to collect items such as cupcakes (good) and poison bottles (bad) which will change the appearance of the main character, and also the 'mood' and colour scheme / level design of the game.
The 'good' items that you collect will add 5 points to your score, and the 'bad' items will subtract 5 points.
The aim of the game is to complete the level without falling into a hole or blowing yourself up by colliding with the scenery, and get the highest score you can.
I really wish I could have gotten the application working with geolocation AND the points on the map. But overall I am not unhappy with the site. If I could get real data from animal sanctuaries, and get the geolocation map displaying information, then it could be a viable application.
