Tag Archives: Ants

These Ants Are Among Nature’s Most Efficient Teams

Posted on by
Reply

Weaver Ant Folding Paper

Dr. Chris Reid, Macquarie University

Weaver Ant chains can easily surpass all other creatures.

Weaver Ants (Oecophylla smaragdina), found from India to northern Australia, create long chains to gather leaves and construct nests. They grip one another by holding onto the abdomen of the ant in front using their mandibles.

To assess their strength, Chris Reed from Macquarie University in Sydney and his team provided the Weaver Ants with paper leaves instead of real ones for nesting. They attached a transducer to the tip of the paper leaf to measure the force exerted by a group of up to 17 ants while rolling the paper.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ixamog0honi

Researchers discovered that individual ants could generate an average pulling force of 60 times their body weight, while in teams of 15, each ant was capable of pulling over 100 times their weight. Consequently, the average power contribution per ant nearly doubled in group settings.

This finding seemingly contradicts the well-established principle of teamwork known as the Ringelmann effect, which posits that larger groups tend to diminish individual productivity due to loss of coordination and motivation.

The researchers did not calculate how Weaver Ants compare to humans in terms of strength, but Reid noted that even without scaling up to human size, they would pose formidable opponents in a tug-of-war. “Even a guinea pig-sized Weaver Ant could outpull a human,” he remarked. “Their key advantage lies in having six legs, which provides excellent traction.”

This might explain their ability to counteract the Ringelmann effect, according to Reid. The precise mechanism behind their collective strength remains unclear, but one theory suggests that some ants are anchored to the ground while others are pulling, effectively creating a force ratchet.

“When comparing Weaver Ants with other species, their ability to exert force on the ground is extraordinarily high, significantly surpassing that of other ants,” Reed stated.

Insects and Ecosystem Expedition Safari: Sri Lanka

Embark on a journey to the heart of Sri Lanka’s diverse biodiversity on this unique entomology and ecosystem-focused expedition.

Topics:

Source: www.newscientist.com

Discovery of fossils of 113 million fiery ants in Brazil

Posted on by
Reply

Paleontologists describe the oldest known members of Haidomyrmecinae – An extinct subfamily of ants that were only during the Cretaceous period – preserved as an impression of limestone rocks in the Krato Formation in northeastern Brazil.

Vulcanidris cratensisholotype. Scale bar – 2 mm. Image credit: Lepeco et al. , doi: 10.1016/j.cub.2025.03.023.

It has been named Vulcanidris cratensisthe new ant species lived 113 million years ago (early Cretaceous period).

This species represents the oldest and most definitive ant known in science, and is also the most complete evidence of the early evolution of ants in the fossil record.

“Vulcanidris cratensis The author, Dr. Anson Lepeco, a paleontologist at Dr. Zloria da Universad de Sao Paulo, stated:

“What makes this discovery particularly interesting is its belong to an extinct “hell ant”, known for its strange predatory adaptation. ”

“Even though it is part of an ancient lineage, the species already exhibits highly specialized anatomical features, suggesting unique hunting behaviors.”

The oldest previous ants were found in France and Myanmar and were preserved in amber instead of limestone.

The presence of hell ants in Brazil indicates that ants are already widely distributed and diversified early in their evolution.

“There was an hell ants explained by Amber, and this was the first time I could visualize them in a rock fossil,” Dr. Lepeco said.

Dr. Lepeco and his colleagues discovered a very well-preserved Ant specimen and systematically examined one of the world’s largest collections of fossil insects from. Krato Layera deposit known for its exceptional fossil preservation.

“When we encountered this extraordinary specimen, we quickly recognized its importance not only as a new species, but also as a potentially conclusive evidence of ants in the Krato Formation,” Dr. Lepeco said.

“The finding highlights the importance of a thorough investigation of existing collections either privately or in museums, and highlights the fauna of Brazilian paleontology and the country’s unexposed fossil insects.”

Using microcomputed tomography imaging, paleontologists discovered it Vulcanidris cratensis It was previously closely related to hell ants, known only from specimens preserved in Burma mber, Myanmar.

This finding shows that ants must have been widely distributed worldwide and repeatedly crossed Cretaceous lands.

But what surprised them most was the professional traits of Hell’s Ants.

“We were hoping to find the features of the hellish ant, but we were shocked by the features of the feeding device,” Dr. Lepeco said.

“Unlike modern ants with laterally moving mandibles, this species had a mandible with face and face projections running forward in front of their head and eyes.”

“Finding such anatomically specialized ants for 113 million years ago challenges our assumptions about how quickly and complex adaptations these insects have developed.”

“The complex forms suggest that even these early ants had evolved sophisticated plundering strategies that were already very different from their modern counterparts.”

“The discovery of this new ant specimen raises broader questions about the evolutionary pressures that have led to the unique adaptation of hell’s ants.”

“Advanced imaging tools allow us to explore these fossil specimens in greater detail than ever before.”

Discovery of Vulcanidris cratensis Reported in a paper It’s published in the journal today Current Biology.

____

Anderson Repeco et al. Ants from Hell from the Lower Cretaceous period in Brazil. Current BiologyPublished online on April 24, 2025. doi:10.1016/j.cub.2025.03.023

Source: www.sci.news

Decoding the Mystery Behind the Velvet Ant’s Venom and its Painful Sting

Posted on by
Reply

Velvet ants inject venom through their abdomen and sting.

JoJo Dexter/Getty Images

The bite of a female velvet ant is one of the most painful in the animal kingdom. Now, researchers have shown that the venoms of these insects contain multiple proteins that make them highly effective against a wide range of victims, including invertebrates, mammals, birds, reptiles, and amphibians. I discovered it.

Velvet ants are actually members of the wingless wasp family, of which there are over 7,000 species. Justin Schmidt, the researcher who created the Schmidt Sting Index, described the pain of a sting as “explosive and long-lasting, making you scream and feel like you’re going crazy. Hot oil from a deep fryer spills all over your hand.” .”

When I looked into what was causing so much pain, Dan Tracy Researchers at Indiana University urged the public to carefully collect female scarlet velvet ants.Dasimtyla occidentalis) from the Indiana and Kentucky sites.

They tested fruit fly venom (Drosophila melanogaster),mouse(Mus musculus) and praying mantis (tenodera sinensis), potential predators of velvet ants.

One of the peptides the research team isolated from the venom, Do6a, clearly caused a response in the insects, but surprisingly not in the mice.

“That means the venom has evolved to include components that specifically target pain-sensing neurons in insects, and other components that target mammals,” Tracy says.

The researchers further tested this by having praying mantises attempt to capture velvet ants.

“We found that velvet ants are constantly stinging praying mantises in self-defense to escape their clutches,” Tracy says.

However, when tested with other peptides isolated from velvet ant venom, called Do10a and Do13a, the mice showed a strong pain response.

After discovering the peptide that activated neurons, the researchers compared the venom peptide sequences of four other species of velvet ants.

“They all have nearly the same version of the peptide that strongly activates the insect’s pain-sensing neurons.” Lydia Boljonteam members at Indiana University. “There are also some peptides that are similar to common neuron activators, but with some differences. Therefore, pain may be triggered in a similar way in other velvet ant species.”

This research could help develop new pain treatments for humans, Borjon said.

topic:

Source: www.newscientist.com

Observing bees protect their nest by using their wings to ward off ants

Posted on by
Reply

Japanese honeybees flap their wings to knock down ants that try to invade their nest.

Ants often invade honeybee hives to steal honey, prey on eggs, and kill worker bees. In defense, honeybees are known to fan their wings to blow ants away. Researchers have documented bees making contact with ants using their wings to physically knock them out of the hive, a behavior that has not been studied before.

High-speed camera footage shows guard wasps near the entrance of the hive leaning towards approaching ants, then flapping their wings to change direction and escape. If they hit the ant, it’s blown away.

Many beekeepers seem unaware of this strategy, as noted by Yoshiko Sakamoto. “I have never noticed this behavior in my nearly 10 years of beekeeping experience,” she says.

Researchers Yugo Seko and Kiyoto Morii from the National Institute for Environmental Studies in Tsukuba introduced three species of native ants to the entrances of two Japanese honeybee hives (Honeybees colonies) and captured footage of hundreds of insect duels.

In most interactions, the bees hit the ants with their wings. However, this defense method is not always successful. Against some ants such as Pristomyrmex punctatus and Japanese street ants (Tsushima), the ants were blown away in about half to one third of attempts. This method was less effective against Japanese forest ants (Formica japonica), a larger and faster species.

Ants present varying levels of threat to bees, with some species being more aggressive than others. Bees may have evolved to use the wing-flailing defense tactic to avoid contact with more dangerous ants, while being more efficient against other species, according to the researchers.

The team plans to further study the bees’ responses to ant attacks and observe how the interaction between bees and ants evolves over time. They also aim to investigate whether the bees’ wing-beating skills improve as they gain experience. “There are still many mysteries surrounding this defensive behavior,” Morii says.

topic:

Source: www.newscientist.com

Carpenter ants possess the ability to perform life-saving amputation surgery on injured nestmates

Posted on by
Reply

Carpenter Ants (Camponotus) – Jumping spiders, a diverse genus of large ants that inhabit many forested areas around the world, are able to selectively treat the injured limbs of their nestmates by cleaning or amputating the wounds.

Injured (marked in yellow) Camponotus floridanus. His wounds are being treated by his nestmates. Image credit: Frank others., doi: 10.1016/j.cub.2024.06.021.

For animals, open wounds pose a significant risk of infection and death. To reduce these risks, many animal species apply antibacterial compounds to wounds.

In 2023, researchers discovered another ant species, Megaponera analis, uses special glands to inject antibacterial compounds into wounds, reducing the chance of infection.

Florida carpenter ant (Camponotus floridanus) and other species of the same genus Camponotus. Notably, they lack such glands and therefore appear to use only mechanical means to treat their nestmates.

Dr. Eric Frank from the University of Würzburg and his colleagues discovered that this mechanical care involves one of two pathways.

The ants either clean the wound using only their mouthparts, or clean it and then amputate the leg completely.

When choosing which route to take, Ali appears to be assessing the type of injury and tailoring the best treatment approach based on information.

The study analyzed two types of leg injuries: femur lacerations and ankle-like tibial lacerations.

All femur injuries involved a nestmate first cleaning the cut and then biting off the entire leg, in contrast to the tibia injuries, which involved only mouth cleaning.

In both cases, the intervention resulted in a significant increase in survival of ants with experimentally infected wounds.

“With femur injuries, we always end up amputating the leg, and we have about a 90 to 95 percent success rate. And with tibia injuries, where we don’t amputate, we achieve about a 75 percent survival rate,” Dr. Frank said.

“This is in contrast to the survival rates of untreated infected femoral and tibial abrasions, which are less than 40 percent and 15 percent, respectively.”

The scientists hypothesized that preferred methods of wound care may be related to the risk of infection from the wound site.

Micro-CT scans of the femur confirmed that it was mostly composed of muscle tissue, suggesting that it played a functional role in pumping blood, called hemolymph, from the leg to the trunk.

When the femur is damaged, the muscles are damaged and the ability to circulate blood that may be contaminated with bacteria is reduced.

The tibia, on the other hand, has very little musculature and little contribution to blood circulation.

“With a tibia injury, the hemolymph flow is less disrupted, allowing bacteria to enter the body more quickly, whereas a femur injury slows down the rate at which blood circulates in the leg,” Dr Frank said.

“If tibial injury would hasten infection, one might expect that amputation of the entire leg would be the most appropriate option, but in fact the opposite has been observed.”

“It turns out that the speed at which the ants can sever the legs makes a difference.”

“An amputation surgery using ants takes at least 40 minutes to complete.”

“Experiments have demonstrated that in the case of tibial injuries, the ants cannot survive unless the leg is removed soon after infection.”

“This means that the ants cannot cut their legs quickly enough to prevent the spread of harmful bacteria, so by taking their time cleaning the wound in their shins they try to reduce a potentially fatal infection,” says Dr Laurent Keller, an evolutionary biologist at the University of Lausanne.

“The fact that ants can diagnose wounds, determine whether they are infected or sterile, and then treat them accordingly over time with other individuals — the only medical system that could match that would be the human medical system.”

Given the sophisticated nature of these behaviors, the next question to ask is how these ants are able to perform such precise care.

“This is all innate behaviour; ants’ behaviour changes as individuals age, but there is little evidence of learning,” Dr Keller said.

of Investigation result Published in the journal Current Biology.

_____

Eric T. Frank othersIn order to combat infections in the ant community, they amputate legs depending on the injury. Current BiologyPublished online July 2, 2024; doi: 10.1016/j.cub.2024.06.021

This article is based on an original release by Cell Press.

Source: www.sci.news

Ants remove limbs of their nestmates to prevent infection

Posted on by
Reply

Termites in Florida

Paul Young/Alamy

Some ants will bite off the infected limbs of their nestmates to improve their chances of survival, making them the only non-human animals documented to amputate a limb to save the life of another animal.

Ants are already known to be one of the few animals that treat the wounds of their fellow creatures.Megaponera analisFor example, bacteria can treat infections by secreting antibacterial substances that are secreted from special glands.

But not all ant species have these glands, he said. Eric Frank “We wanted to know what would happen to the ants when they couldn’t use antibiotics,” said researchers from the University of Würzburg in Germany.

If you look closely at a colony of Florida carpenter ants (Camponotus floridanus) In the lab, Frank’s colleague Danny Buffatto of the University of Lausanne in Switzerland discovered ants biting off the injured legs of their nestmates.

“I didn’t believe it at first,” says Frank, “I thought there must be something else going on. Maybe there was a threat, or maybe the ants thought they were attacking an enemy.”

Analysing video footage from the colony, the team found many more cases of amputation, none of which showed any signs of resistance, and moreover, these amputations were only performed on animals in the thigh area.

To investigate further, the team injured the femurs of 72 carpenter ants and infected them. Half of the ants had their legs amputated by the researchers, while the rest served as controls. Mortality rates of the amputated ants were 90 percent lower than those of the controls, suggesting that the treatment successfully prevented the spread of the pathogen.

In contrast, in other ants, amputations never occurred when the wounds were on the ants’ lower legs, and when the team repeated the experiment with lower-leg injuries, the amputation and control groups died at the same rate. This may be due to the ants’ physiology, Frank says. “Insects don’t have a central heart like humans do,” he says. Instead, several muscles pump blood around the body, and by using micro-CT scanning, the team found that many of these muscles are concentrated in the carpenter ants’ upper legs.

This means that amputating the upper leg would damage the muscles that pump blood, restricting blood circulation and allowing the infection to spread, whereas amputating the lower leg would not prevent the infection from spreading because it does not have these muscles.

“This discovery is remarkable and pushes the boundaries of our understanding of the behavioral immune system of social insects,” said Dr. James Traniello At Boston University in Massachusetts.

Tomer Chakkes Researchers at the University of Regensburg in Germany were surprised at how targeted the amputations were: “They don’t just do amputations for any injury, but only when it makes sense.”

“It’s unlikely that the ants understand the ultimate reasons why these cuts work; rather, it’s more likely that this is an innate behavior that they’re ‘born’ with,” he says.

topic:

Source: www.newscientist.com

Research reveals that these ants possess the remarkable ability to perform life-saving emergency surgery on one another

Posted on by
Reply

Florida carpenter ants are unique in their behavior, as they have been observed selectively cutting off the injured limbs of their nestmates. This unusual behavior was discovered in a study published in Current Biology, where researchers found that the ants use this “surgery” as a form of treatment for their injured companions. The ants were observed to carefully evaluate each injury and decide whether to clean the wound or amputate the leg entirely, based on the extent of the injury.

Lead author David Levine, a behavioural ecologist at the University of Würzburg, described this behavior as unique in the animal kingdom, as it involves one ant surgically treating another without the use of any tools. Unlike other ants that have specialized glands for wound treatment, Florida Carpenter ants rely solely on mechanical means to care for their injured nestmates.

The study found that the ants have a high success rate in treating femoral injuries, where amputation is required, compared to tibial injuries that can be treated with a simple mouthwash. This indicates that the ants have a sophisticated system for evaluating and treating wounds effectively to improve the chances of survival for the injured ants.

Credit: Bert Zielstra

The researchers believe that the ants’ ability to diagnose and treat wounds in such a precise manner is comparable to the human medical system. Further research is being conducted to understand if similar behavior exists in other ant species and to explore the ants’ tolerance to pain during these prolonged surgical procedures.

read more:

Source: www.sciencefocus.com

Queen ants have a valid explanation for consuming their young.

Posted on by
Reply

A colony of black garden ants in a nest with several eggs, pupae, larvae and a large queen bee

Nick Bruning/Shutterstock

When a black ant queen notices that her young are sick, she eats them before the disease spreads to other parts of the nest.

Cannibal queens may not win the “Mother of the Year” award, but research suggests this strategy could be an effective way to protect the kingdom. The findings provide insight into the evolution of “filial cannibalism,'' the practice of parents consuming their children.

Ants and other colony-dwelling social insects can prevent the spread of disease by forcing workers to self-isolate when they become sick and by eliminating infected nestmates. These “social immunity” obligations are well known, he writes. Flynn Bizzell and christopher pull at Oxford University. But since the ant queen starts colonies alone, how does she protect herself from disease as she builds and grows her nest?

To find out, Bizell and Puru collected newly mated black ants (Lasius Niger) took the queen to the laboratory. Once the ants had laid eggs and started building nests, the researchers removed the larvae from the queen and exposed some to deadly ant spores. Metahydium A fungus that infects wild ant nests. After a period of time during which these larvae developed a potentially fatal infection, the researchers returned all of the larvae to their mothers, even though they were not yet contagious.

The queen ate 92 percent of the diseased larvae, but only 6 percent of the larvae were uninfected, indicating that the queen was able to detect infection and intervene. Failure to catch the infection can have dire consequences. When the researchers exposed the colonies to the carcasses of highly infectious larvae that had sprouted spore-producing fungi, all the larvae died. And even after spraying the carcasses with an acidic antibacterial toxin, only 20 percent of the queens survived.

Despite these risks, queen bees that feed on infected larvae appear to avoid harm. Researchers suggest that queen bees may be ingesting their own antimicrobial toxins to make their intestines hostile to fungal spores. Based on this conclusion, they Observation of worker ants before they swallow the poison The team then observed the queen bee tending to the openings of her venom glands.

“If the queen gets infected and dies, the colony dies as well,” he says. sebastian stockmeyer She is at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, as she is the only one with the ability to reproduce. Therefore, it makes sense that evolved strategies to deal with disease would emphasize queen survival.

There are other benefits to eating sick babies as well. The researchers found that queens that ate sick offspring laid 55% more eggs than queens that did not, suggesting that they recycled these caloric resources. The researchers argue that this benefit and the elimination of disease risk could indicate how filial cannibalism evolves in some species.

Joel Meunier Researchers at the University of Tours in France believe that offspring that hatch after their older siblings are eaten may have immune systems that better protect against fungal infections. If so, proving this may reveal the “double benefit” of filial cannibalism for both mother and offspring.

This finding suggests that there is overlap in the behaviors needed to care for young and prevent disease in young colonies. As a result, Bizell and Pule argue that workers' disease prevention behaviors may have evolved from common parental care found in many types of insects.

topic:

Source: www.newscientist.com

Matabele ants discovered to use antibacterial compounds for treating infected wounds

Posted on by
Reply

Infected wounds pose a significant mortality risk to animals. Injuries are common in Matabeleari (Megaponera analis), raiding warlike prey. New research shows that these predatory ants can tell when a wound has become infected and treat it accordingly. Workers apply various antimicrobial compounds and proteins secreted from the retropleura to infected wounds, reducing mortality rates in infected individuals by 90%.

Matabeleari (Megaponera analis) He cares for the wound of a fellow ant whose leg was bitten off during a fight with termites. Image credit: Erik Frank / University of Würzburg.

Infectious diseases are a major mortality risk for animals, and animals that live in groups are particularly at risk of contracting life-threatening contagious pathogens.

This has led to a series of pathogen-induced changes in social interactions, including social distancing, disease signaling, and medical care.

Injured people are an easy entry point for life-threatening infections because their primary barrier to infection, the epidermis, or epidermis, is damaged.

Recently, some mammals have been shown to lick wounds to apply antiseptic saliva. However, the effectiveness of these actions remains largely unknown and occurs regardless of wound status.

In social insects, interactions to combat pathogens range from preventive measures such as nest disinfection and conspecific grooming, to dying individuals leaving the nest and dying in isolation, to destructive disinfection of infected mates. It's wide-ranging.

However, whether and how social insect colonies care for injured individuals exposed to pathogens is still poorly understood.

Predatory Matabele ant workers have been known to treat injuries to their nestmates, a common occurrence since the ants only feed on belligerent termites. As many as 22% of collectors engaged in termite raids lose one or two of their legs.

Injured workers are carried to the nest, and for the first three hours after injury, other workers treat the wound by licking and grooming the wound.

If the wounds of injured workers are not treated by nestmates, 90% of the injured workers die within 24 hours after injury, but the mechanisms of these treatments are unknown.

“The aim of our study was to identify the causes of death in injured individuals and the potential mechanisms involved in the detection and treatment of injuries,” said first author Eric, a researcher at the University of Lausanne and the University of Würzburg.・Dr. Frank said. , and his colleagues.

they discovered gram-negative bacteria Pseudomonas aeruginosa It caused a fatal infection in injured Matabele ant workers.

They showed that wound infections were associated with specific changes in the epidermal hydrocarbon profile, allowing nestmates to diagnose the infected status of the injured and apply appropriate antimicrobial treatment. .

They also identified 112 chemical compounds and 41 proteins in secretions from the ants' posterior thymus, half of which were found to have antibacterial or wound-healing properties.

“Chemical analysis showed that the hydrocarbon profile of the ant's epidermis changes as a result of wound infection,” Dr. Frank said.

“It is precisely this change that allows the ants to recognize and diagnose the infection status of injured nestmates.”

“For treatment, they apply antibacterial compounds and proteins to the infected wound. They ingest these antibiotics through the retropleura, which is located on the side of the thorax.”

“The secretion contains 112 components, half of which have antibacterial and wound healing effects.”

“And this treatment is highly effective, reducing the mortality rate of infected people by 90%.”

“Aside from humans, I don't know of any other creature capable of such sophisticated wound healing.”

“These findings have medical implications because the main pathogens in ant wounds are Pseudomonas aeruginosait is also a major cause of human infections, and some strains are resistant to antibiotics,” said the study's senior author, Dr. Laurent Keller from the University of Lausanne.

of result appear in the diary nature communications.

_____

ET Frank other. 2023. Targeted treatment of injured nestmates with antimicrobial compounds in an ant community. Nat Commune 14, 8446; doi: 10.1038/s41467-023-43885-w

Source: www.sci.news