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Cristín J, Fernández-López P, Lloret-Cabot R, Genovart M, Méndez V, Bartumeus F, Campos D. Spatiotemporal organization of ant foraging from a complex systems perspective. Sci Rep 2024; 14:12801. [PMID: 38834710 DOI: 10.1038/s41598-024-63307-1] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/28/2024] [Accepted: 05/27/2024] [Indexed: 06/06/2024] Open
Abstract
We use complex systems science to explore the emergent behavioral patterns that typify eusocial species, using collective ant foraging as a paradigmatic example. Our particular aim is to provide a methodology to quantify how the collective orchestration of foraging provides functional advantages to ant colonies. For this, we combine (i) a purpose-built experimental arena replicating ant foraging across realistic spatial and temporal scales, and (ii) a set of analytical tools, grounded in information theory and spin-glass approaches, to explore the resulting data. This combined approach yields computational replicas of the colonies; these are high-dimensional models that store the experimental foraging patterns through a training process, and are then able to generate statistically similar patterns, in an analogous way to machine learning tools. These in silico models are then used to explore the colony performance under different resource availability scenarios. Our findings highlight how replicas of the colonies trained under constant and predictable experimental food conditions exhibit heightened foraging efficiencies, manifested in reduced times for food discovery and gathering, and accelerated transmission of information under similar conditions. However, these same replicas demonstrate a lack of resilience when faced with new foraging conditions. Conversely, replicas of colonies trained under fluctuating and uncertain food conditions reveal lower efficiencies at specific environments but increased resilience to shifts in food location.
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Affiliation(s)
- Javier Cristín
- Istituto Sistemi Complessi, Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche, UOS Sapienza, 00185, Rome, Italy
- Dipartimento di Fisica, Universita' Sapienza, 00185, Rome, Italy
- Grup de Física Estadística, Departament de Física. Facultat de Ciències), Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, 08193, Bellaterra, Barcelona, Spain
| | - Pol Fernández-López
- Centre d'Estudis Avançats de Blanes (CEAB-CSIC), Blanes Girona, Spain
- CREAF, Cerdanyola del Vallès, Barcelona, Spain
| | - Roger Lloret-Cabot
- Centre d'Estudis Avançats de Blanes (CEAB-CSIC), Blanes Girona, Spain
- CREAF, Cerdanyola del Vallès, Barcelona, Spain
| | - Meritxell Genovart
- Centre d'Estudis Avançats de Blanes (CEAB-CSIC), Blanes Girona, Spain
- CREAF, Cerdanyola del Vallès, Barcelona, Spain
| | - Viçenc Méndez
- Grup de Física Estadística, Departament de Física. Facultat de Ciències), Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, 08193, Bellaterra, Barcelona, Spain
| | - Frederic Bartumeus
- Centre d'Estudis Avançats de Blanes (CEAB-CSIC), Blanes Girona, Spain
- CREAF, Cerdanyola del Vallès, Barcelona, Spain
- ICREA, Institut Català de Recerca i Estudis Avançats, Barcelona, Spain
| | - Daniel Campos
- Grup de Física Estadística, Departament de Física. Facultat de Ciències), Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, 08193, Bellaterra, Barcelona, Spain.
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Burchill AT, Pavlic TP, Pratt SC, Reid CR. Weaver ants regulate the rate of prey delivery during collective vertical transport. J Exp Biol 2023; 226:jeb245634. [PMID: 37671439 DOI: 10.1242/jeb.245634] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/03/2023] [Accepted: 08/21/2023] [Indexed: 09/07/2023]
Abstract
The collective transport of massive food items by ant teams is a striking example of biological cooperation, but it remains unclear how these decentralized teams coordinate to overcome the various challenges associated with transport. Previous research has focused on transport across horizontal surfaces and very shallow inclines, disregarding the complexity of natural foraging environments. In the ant Oecophylla smaragdina, prey are routinely carried up tree trunks to arboreal nests. Using this species, we induced collective transport over a variety of angled surfaces with varying prey masses to investigate how ants respond to inclines. We found that weight and incline pose qualitatively different challenges during transport. Prey were carried over vertical and inclined surfaces faster than across horizontal surfaces, even though inclines were associated with longer routes and a higher probability of dropping the load. This additional speed was associated with more transporters being allocated to loads on steeper inclines and not with the persistence of individual ants. Ant teams also regulated a stable prey delivery rate (rate of return per transporter) across all treatments. Our proposed constrained optimization model suggests a possible explanation for these results; theoretically, prey intake rate at the colony level is maximized when the allocation of transporters yields a similar prey delivery rate across loads.
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Affiliation(s)
- Andrew T Burchill
- School of Life Sciences, Arizona State University, Tempe, AZ 85281, USA
| | - Theodore P Pavlic
- School of Life Sciences, Arizona State University, Tempe, AZ 85281, USA
- School of Computing and Augmented Intelligence, Arizona State University, Tempe, AZ 85281, USA
| | - Stephen C Pratt
- School of Life Sciences, Arizona State University, Tempe, AZ 85281, USA
| | - Chris R Reid
- School of Natural Sciences, Macquarie University, Macquarie Park, NSW 2109, Australia
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Habitat-dependent variation in consistent behavioural traits does not affect the efficiency of resource acquisition in a thermophilic ant. Behav Ecol Sociobiol 2023. [DOI: 10.1007/s00265-022-03274-7] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 12/04/2022]
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Prey Status Affects Paralysis Investment in the Ponerine Ant Harpegnathos venator. INSECTS 2021; 13:insects13010026. [PMID: 35055869 PMCID: PMC8780582 DOI: 10.3390/insects13010026] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/19/2021] [Revised: 12/18/2021] [Accepted: 12/23/2021] [Indexed: 11/29/2022]
Abstract
Simple Summary Some ants sting their prey to paralyze or kill them when foraging. Some studies have found that paralysis of prey may also be used in food storage. To further understand the foraging behavior of predatory ants and the underlying mechanism, we systematically observed the foraging behavior of Harpegnathos venator when provided with different types of food, different prey sizes, and different prey numbers, and we studied its paralysis behavior in relation to prey under different food supply conditions through controlled experiments. We found that the stings of Harpegnathos venator completely paralyzed the cockroaches. The stinging time was significantly longer at a higher prey activity level and for larger cockroaches. In addition, there was no significant difference in the stinging time of H. venator for different prey densities. It was much shorter for legless cockroaches than for normal cockroaches. The results showed that the longer the stinging time for similar cockroaches, the longer it took for the prey to revive and move. The results are helpful for further understanding the behavioral mechanism underlying prey storage in predatory insects. Abstract The paralysis behavior of some ponerine ants when foraging may be important for food storage and colony development. However, how workers invest in paralysis under different prey circumstances is often overlooked. Here, we report the prey-foraging behavior and paralysis behavior of Harpegnathos venator under different food supply conditions. Solitary hunting was the main foraging mode of H. venator, with occasional simple collective hunting. Nymphal cockroaches with high activity were the most attractive to H. venator. In the experiment, we found that the stings of H. venator completely paralyzed the cockroaches. The stinging time was significantly longer at a higher prey activity level and for larger cockroaches. In addition, there was no significant difference in the stinging time of H. venator for different prey densities. The results showed that the longer similar cockroaches were stung, the longer it took for them to revive and move. These results are helpful for further understanding the behavioral mechanism underlying the food storage of live prey by predatory insects.
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Pereira H, Willeput R, Detrain C. A fungus infected environment does not alter the behaviour of foraging ants. Sci Rep 2021; 11:23573. [PMID: 34876627 PMCID: PMC8651729 DOI: 10.1038/s41598-021-02817-8] [Citation(s) in RCA: 2] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/29/2021] [Accepted: 11/17/2021] [Indexed: 11/24/2022] Open
Abstract
Eusocial insects are exposed to a wide range of pathogens while foraging outside their nest. We know that opportunistic scavenging ants are able to assess the sanitary state of food and to discriminate a prey which died from infection by the entomopathogenic fungus Metarhizium brunneum. Here, we investigate whether a contamination of the environment can also influence the behaviour of foragers, both at the individual and collective level. In a Y-maze, Myrmica rubra ants had the choice to forage on two prey patches, one of which containing sporulating items. Unexpectedly, the nearby presence of sporulating bodies did not deter foragers nor prevent them from retrieving palatable prey. Ant colonies exploited both prey patches equally, without further mortality resulting from foraging on the contaminated area. Thus, a contamination of the environment did not prompt an active avoidance by foragers of which the activity depended primarily on the food characteristics. Generalist entomopathogenic fungi such as M. brunneum in the area around the nest appear more to be of a nuisance to ant foragers than a major selective force driving them to adopt avoidance strategies. We discuss the cost-benefit balance derived from the fine-tuning of strategies of pathogen avoidance in ants.
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Affiliation(s)
- Hugo Pereira
- Unit of Social Ecology, Université Libre de Bruxelles, CP 231, 50 avenue F. Roosevelt, 1050, Brussels, Belgium.
| | - Romain Willeput
- grid.4989.c0000 0001 2348 0746Unit of Social Ecology, Université Libre de Bruxelles, CP 231, 50 avenue F. Roosevelt, 1050 Brussels, Belgium
| | - Claire Detrain
- Unit of Social Ecology, Université Libre de Bruxelles, CP 231, 50 avenue F. Roosevelt, 1050, Brussels, Belgium.
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Nauta J, Khaluf Y, Simoens P. Resource ephemerality influences effectiveness of altruistic behavior in collective foraging. SWARM INTELLIGENCE 2021. [DOI: 10.1007/s11721-021-00205-6] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/28/2022]
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Fisher DN, Kilgour RJ, Siracusa ER, Foote JR, Hobson EA, Montiglio PO, Saltz JB, Wey TW, Wice EW. Anticipated effects of abiotic environmental change on intraspecific social interactions. Biol Rev Camb Philos Soc 2021; 96:2661-2693. [PMID: 34212487 DOI: 10.1111/brv.12772] [Citation(s) in RCA: 27] [Impact Index Per Article: 9.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/24/2019] [Revised: 06/18/2021] [Accepted: 06/21/2021] [Indexed: 12/30/2022]
Abstract
Social interactions are ubiquitous across the animal kingdom. A variety of ecological and evolutionary processes are dependent on social interactions, such as movement, disease spread, information transmission, and density-dependent reproduction and survival. Social interactions, like any behaviour, are context dependent, varying with environmental conditions. Currently, environments are changing rapidly across multiple dimensions, becoming warmer and more variable, while habitats are increasingly fragmented and contaminated with pollutants. Social interactions are expected to change in response to these stressors and to continue to change into the future. However, a comprehensive understanding of the form and magnitude of the effects of these environmental changes on social interactions is currently lacking. Focusing on four major forms of rapid environmental change currently occurring, we review how these changing environmental gradients are expected to have immediate effects on social interactions such as communication, agonistic behaviours, and group formation, which will thereby induce changes in social organisation including mating systems, dominance hierarchies, and collective behaviour. Our review covers intraspecific variation in social interactions across environments, including studies in both the wild and in laboratory settings, and across a range of taxa. The expected responses of social behaviour to environmental change are diverse, but we identify several general themes. First, very dry, variable, fragmented, or polluted environments are likely to destabilise existing social systems. This occurs as these conditions limit the energy available for complex social interactions and affect dissimilar phenotypes differently. Second, a given environmental change can lead to opposite responses in social behaviour, and the direction of the response often hinges on the natural history of the organism in question. Third, our review highlights the fact that changes in environmental factors are not occurring in isolation: multiple factors are changing simultaneously, which may have antagonistic or synergistic effects, and more work should be done to understand these combined effects. We close by identifying methodological and analytical techniques that might help to study the response of social interactions to changing environments, highlight consistent patterns among taxa, and predict subsequent evolutionary change. We expect that the changes in social interactions that we document here will have consequences for individuals, groups, and for the ecology and evolution of populations, and therefore warrant a central place in the study of animal populations, particularly in an era of rapid environmental change.
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Affiliation(s)
- David N Fisher
- School of Biological Sciences, University of Aberdeen, King's College, Aberdeen, AB24 3FX, U.K
| | - R Julia Kilgour
- Department of Animal Sciences, Purdue University, West Lafayette, IN, 47907, U.S.A
| | - Erin R Siracusa
- Centre for Research in Animal Behaviour, School of Psychology, University of Exeter, Stocker Road, Exeter, EX4 4PY, U.K
| | - Jennifer R Foote
- Department of Biology, Algoma University, 1520 Queen Street East, Sault Ste. Marie, ON, P6A 2G4, Canada
| | - Elizabeth A Hobson
- Department of Biological Sciences, University of Cincinnati, 318 College Drive, Cincinnati, OH, 45221, U.S.A
| | - Pierre-Olivier Montiglio
- Département des Sciences Biologiques, Université du Québec à Montréal, 141 Avenue Président-Kennedy, Montréal, QC, H2X 3X8, Canada
| | - Julia B Saltz
- Department of Biosciences, Rice University, 6100 Main Street, Houston, TX, 77005-1827, U.S.A
| | - Tina W Wey
- Maelstrom Research, The Research Institute of the McGill University Health Centre, Montreal General Hospital, 1650 Cedar Avenue, Montréal, QC, H3G 1A4, Canada
| | - Eric W Wice
- Department of Biosciences, Rice University, 6100 Main Street, Houston, TX, 77005-1827, U.S.A
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Reznikova Z. Ants’ Personality and Its Dependence on Foraging Styles: Research Perspectives. Front Ecol Evol 2021. [DOI: 10.3389/fevo.2021.661066] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 12/29/2022] Open
Abstract
The paper is devoted to analyzing consistent individual differences in behavior, also known as “personalities,” in the context of a vital ant task—the detection and transportation of food. I am trying to elucidate the extent to which collective cognition is individual-based and whether a single individual’s actions can suffice to direct the entire colony or colony units. The review analyzes personalities in various insects with different life cycles and provides new insights into the role of individuals in directing group actions in ants. Although it is widely accepted that, in eusocial insects, colony personality emerges from the workers’ personalities, there are only a few examples of investigations of personality at the individual level. The central question of the review is how the distribution of behavioral types and cognitive responsibilities within ant colonies depends on a species’ foraging style. In the context of how workers’ behavioral traits display during foraging, a crucial question is what makes an ant a scout that discovers a new food source and mobilizes its nestmates. In mass recruiting, tandem-running, and even in group-recruiting species displaying leadership, the division of labor between scouts and recruits appears to be ephemeral. There is only little, if any, evidence of ants’ careers and behavioral consistency as leaders. Personal traits characterize groups of individuals at the colony level but not performers of functional roles during foraging. The leader-scouting seems to be the only known system that is based on a consistent personal difference between scouting and foraging individuals.
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Constantino PB, Valentinuzzi VS, Helene AF. Division of labor in work shifts by leaf-cutting ants. Sci Rep 2021; 11:8737. [PMID: 33888758 PMCID: PMC8062660 DOI: 10.1038/s41598-021-88005-0] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 10/08/2019] [Accepted: 08/31/2020] [Indexed: 11/09/2022] Open
Abstract
Foraging rhythms in eusocial insects are determined by the colony´s overall pattern. However, in leaf-cutting ant workers, individual rhythms are not fully synchronized with the colonies' rhythm. The colony as a whole is nocturnal, since most worker activity takes place at night; however some workers forage during the day. Previous studies in individualized ants suggest nocturnal and diurnal workers coexistence. Here observations within the colony, in leaf-cutting ants, showed that workers have differential foraging time preference, which interestingly is associated to body size and differential leaf transportation engagement. Nocturnal ants are smaller and less engaged in leaf transportation whereas diurnal ants are bigger and more engaged in leaf carriage. Mechanisms underlying division of labor in work shifts in ants are still unknown but much can be extrapolated from honeybees; another social system bearing a similar pattern. A collective organization like this favors constant exploitation of food sources while preserving natural individual rhythm patterns, which arise from individual differences, and thermal tolerance, given by the size polymorphism presented by this species.
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Affiliation(s)
- Pedro B Constantino
- Department of Physiology, Instituto de Biociências da Universidade de São Paulo (IB-USP), São Paulo, SP, 05508-090, Brazil.
| | - Veronica S Valentinuzzi
- Centro Regional de Investigaciones Científicas y Transferencia Tecnológica de La Rioja (CRILAR), UNLAR, SEGEMAR, UNCa, CONICET, Anillaco, La Rioja, Argentina
| | - André F Helene
- Department of Physiology, Instituto de Biociências da Universidade de São Paulo (IB-USP), São Paulo, SP, 05508-090, Brazil
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Cristín J, Bartumeus F, Méndez V, Campos D. Occupancy patterns in superorganisms: a spin-glass approach to ant exploration. ROYAL SOCIETY OPEN SCIENCE 2020; 7:201250. [PMID: 33489274 PMCID: PMC7813257 DOI: 10.1098/rsos.201250] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Figures] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/14/2020] [Accepted: 11/23/2020] [Indexed: 06/12/2023]
Abstract
Emergence of collective, as well as superorganism-like, behaviour in biological populations requires the existence of rules of communication, either direct or indirect, between organisms. Because reaching an understanding of such rules at the individual level can be often difficult, approaches carried out at higher, or effective, levels of description can represent a useful alternative. In the present work, we show how a spin-glass approach characteristic of statistical physics can be used as a tool to characterize the properties of the spatial occupancy patterns of a biological population. We exploit the presence of pairwise interactions in spin-glass models for detecting correlations between occupancies at different sites in the media. Such correlations, we claim, represent a proxy to the existence of planned and/or social strategies in the spatial organization of the population. Our spin-glass approach does not only identify those correlations but produces a statistical replica of the system (at the level of occupancy patterns) that can be subsequently used for testing alternative conditions/hypothesis. Here, this methodology is presented and illustrated for a particular case of study: we analyse occupancy patterns of Aphaenogaster senilis ants during foraging through a simplified environment consisting of a discrete (tree-like) artificial lattice. Our spin-glass approach consistently reproduces the experimental occupancy patterns across time, and besides, an intuitive biological interpretation of the parameters is attainable. Likewise, we prove that pairwise correlations are important for reproducing these dynamics by showing how a null model, where such correlations are neglected, would perform much worse; this provides a solid evidence to the existence of superorganism-like strategies in the colony.
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Affiliation(s)
- Javier Cristín
- Grup de Física Estadística, Departament de Física, Facultat de Ciències), Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, 08193 Bellaterra, Barcelona, Spain
| | - Frederic Bartumeus
- Centre d’Estudis Avançats de Blanes (CEAB-CSIC), Carrer Cala Sant Francesc 14 17300 Girona, Spain
- ICREA, Institut Català de Recerca i Estudis Avançats, 08010 Barcelona, Spain
- CREAF, Centre de Recerca Ecològica i Aplicacions Forestals, 08193 Barcelona, Spain
| | - Vicenç Méndez
- Grup de Física Estadística, Departament de Física, Facultat de Ciències), Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, 08193 Bellaterra, Barcelona, Spain
| | - Daniel Campos
- Grup de Física Estadística, Departament de Física, Facultat de Ciències), Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, 08193 Bellaterra, Barcelona, Spain
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Spatial cognition in the context of foraging styles and information transfer in ants. Anim Cogn 2020; 23:1143-1159. [PMID: 32840698 DOI: 10.1007/s10071-020-01423-x] [Citation(s) in RCA: 4] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 12/04/2019] [Revised: 05/13/2020] [Accepted: 08/13/2020] [Indexed: 02/08/2023]
Abstract
Ants are central-place foragers: they always return to the nest, and this requires the ability to remember relationships between features of the environment, or an individual's path through the landscape. The distribution of these cognitive responsibilities within a colony depends on a species' foraging style. Solitary foraging as well as leader-scouting, which is based on information transmission about a distant targets from scouts to foragers, can be considered the most challenging tasks in the context of ants' spatial cognition. Solitary foraging is found in species of almost all subfamilies of ants, whereas leader-scouting has been discovered as yet only in the Formica rufa group of species (red wood ants). Solitary foraging and leader-scouting ant species, although enormously different in their levels of sociality and ecological specificities, have many common traits of individual cognitive navigation, such as the primary use of visual navigation, excellent visual landmark memories, and the subordinate role of odour orientation. In leader-scouting species, spatial cognition and the ability to transfer information about a distant target dramatically differ among scouts and foragers, suggesting individual cognitive specialization. I suggest that the leader-scouting style of recruitment is closely connected with the ecological niche of a defined group of species, in particular, their searching patterns within the tree crown. There is much work to be done to understand what cognitive mechanisms underpin route planning and communication about locations in ants.
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12
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Villalta I, Oms CS, Angulo E, Molinas-González CR, Devers S, Cerdá X, Boulay R. Does social thermal regulation constrain individual thermal tolerance in an ant species? J Anim Ecol 2020; 89:2063-2076. [PMID: 32445419 DOI: 10.1111/1365-2656.13268] [Citation(s) in RCA: 14] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 10/27/2019] [Accepted: 05/06/2020] [Indexed: 11/30/2022]
Abstract
In ants, social thermal regulation is the collective maintenance of a nest temperature that is optimal for individual colony members. In the thermophilic ant Aphaenogaster iberica, two key behaviours regulate nest temperature: seasonal nest relocation and variable nest depth. Outside the nest, foragers must adapt their activity to avoid temperatures that exceed their thermal limits. It has been suggested that social thermal regulation constrains physiological and morphological thermal adaptations at the individual level. We tested this hypothesis by examining the foraging rhythms of six populations of A. iberica, which were found at different elevations (from 100 to 2,000 m) in the Sierra Nevada mountain range of southern Spain. We tested the thermal resistance of individuals from these populations under controlled conditions. Janzen's climatic variability hypothesis (CVH) states that greater climatic variability should select for organisms with broader temperature tolerances. We found that the A. iberica population at 1,300 m experienced the most extreme temperatures and that ants from this population had the highest heat tolerance (LT50 = 57.55°C). These results support CVH's validity at microclimatic scales, such as the one represented by the elevational gradient in this study. Aphaenogaster iberica maintains colony food intake levels across different elevations and mean daily temperatures by shifting its rhythm of activity. This efficient colony-level thermal regulation and the significant differences in individual heat tolerance that we observed among the populations suggest that behaviourally controlled thermal regulation does not constrain individual physiological adaptations for coping with extreme temperatures.
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Affiliation(s)
- Irene Villalta
- Institut de Recherche sur la Biologie de l'Insecte, Université de Tours, Parc de Grandmont, Tours, France.,Estación Biológica de Doñana, CSIC, Sevilla, Spain
| | - Cristela Sánchez Oms
- Institut de Recherche sur la Biologie de l'Insecte, Université de Tours, Parc de Grandmont, Tours, France.,Estación Biológica de Doñana, CSIC, Sevilla, Spain
| | - Elena Angulo
- Estación Biológica de Doñana, CSIC, Sevilla, Spain
| | | | - Séverine Devers
- Institut de Recherche sur la Biologie de l'Insecte, Université de Tours, Parc de Grandmont, Tours, France
| | - Xim Cerdá
- Estación Biológica de Doñana, CSIC, Sevilla, Spain
| | - Raphaël Boulay
- Institut de Recherche sur la Biologie de l'Insecte, Université de Tours, Parc de Grandmont, Tours, France
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Schläppi D, Chejanovsky N, Yañez O, Neumann P. Foodborne Transmission and Clinical Symptoms of Honey Bee Viruses in Ants Lasius spp. Viruses 2020; 12:E321. [PMID: 32192027 PMCID: PMC7150850 DOI: 10.3390/v12030321] [Citation(s) in RCA: 7] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/25/2020] [Revised: 03/11/2020] [Accepted: 03/12/2020] [Indexed: 01/10/2023] Open
Abstract
Emerging infectious diseases are often the products of host shifts, where a pathogen jumps from its original host to a novel species. Viruses in particular cross species barriers frequently. Acute bee paralysis virus (ABPV) and deformed wing virus (DWV) are viruses described in honey bees (Apis mellifera) with broad host ranges. Ants scavenging on dead honey bees may get infected with these viruses via foodborne transmission. However, the role of black garden ants, Lasius niger and Lasius platythorax, as alternative hosts of ABPV and DWV is not known and potential impacts of these viruses have not been addressed yet. In a laboratory feeding experiment, we show that L. niger can carry DWV and ABPV. However, negative-sense strand RNA, a token of virus replication, was only detected for ABPV. Therefore, additional L. niger colonies were tested for clinical symptoms of ABPV infections. Symptoms were detected at colony (fewer emerging workers) and individual level (impaired locomotion and movement speed). In a field survey, all L. platythorax samples carried ABPV, DWV-A and -B, as well as the negative-sense strand RNA of ABPV. These results show that L. niger and L. platythorax are alternative hosts of ABPV, possibly acting as a biological vector of ABPV and as a mechanical one for DWV. This is the first study showing the impact of honey bee viruses on ants. The common virus infections of ants in the field support possible negative consequences for ecosystem functioning due to host shifts.
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Affiliation(s)
- Daniel Schläppi
- Institute of Bee Health, Vetsuisse Faculty, University of Bern, 3097 Bern, Switzerland; (N.C.); (O.Y.); (P.N.)
| | - Nor Chejanovsky
- Institute of Bee Health, Vetsuisse Faculty, University of Bern, 3097 Bern, Switzerland; (N.C.); (O.Y.); (P.N.)
- Department of Entomology, Agricultural Research Organization, Volcani Center, 50250 Bet Dagan, Israel
| | - Orlando Yañez
- Institute of Bee Health, Vetsuisse Faculty, University of Bern, 3097 Bern, Switzerland; (N.C.); (O.Y.); (P.N.)
- Swiss Bee Research Centre, Agroscope, 3097 Bern, Switzerland
| | - Peter Neumann
- Institute of Bee Health, Vetsuisse Faculty, University of Bern, 3097 Bern, Switzerland; (N.C.); (O.Y.); (P.N.)
- Swiss Bee Research Centre, Agroscope, 3097 Bern, Switzerland
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Lehue M, Collignon B, Detrain C. Multiple nest entrances alter foraging and information transfer in ants. ROYAL SOCIETY OPEN SCIENCE 2020; 7:191330. [PMID: 32257309 PMCID: PMC7062076 DOI: 10.1098/rsos.191330] [Citation(s) in RCA: 4] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/03/2019] [Accepted: 01/17/2020] [Indexed: 05/02/2023]
Abstract
The ecological success of ants relies on their ability to discover and collectively exploit available resources. In this process, the nest entrances are key locations at which foragers transfer food and information about the surrounding environment. We assume that the number of nest entrances regulates social exchanges between foragers and inner-nest workers, and hence influences the foraging efficiency of the whole colony. Here, we compared the foraging responses of Myrmica rubra colonies settled in either one-entrance or two-entrance nests. The total outflows of workers exploiting a sucrose food source were similar regardless of the number of nest entrances. However, in the two-entrance nests, the launching of recruitment was delayed, a pheromone trail was less likely to emerge between the nest and the food source, and recruits were less likely to reach the food target. As a result, an additional entrance through which information could transit decreased the efficiency of social foraging and ultimately led to a lower amount of retrieved food. Our study confirms the key-role of nest entrances in the transfer of information from foragers to potential recruits. The influence of the number of entrances on the emergence of a collective trail also highlights the spatially extended impact of the nest architecture that can shape foraging patterns outside the nest.
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Affiliation(s)
- Marine Lehue
- Université Libre de Bruxelles, Bruxelles, Belgium
| | - Bertrand Collignon
- Université Libre de Bruxelles, Bruxelles, Belgium
- Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne, Lausanne, Switzerland
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15
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Route reassessment by transporter ants improves speed and directional accuracy of cooperative transport in Formica japonica. J ETHOL 2019. [DOI: 10.1007/s10164-019-00626-1] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.2] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 10/25/2022]
Abstract
AbstractEncircling cooperative transport in ants is categorized into coordinated and uncoordinated types. Coordinated cooperative transport is considered to be advantageous for ants because it transports food quickly without creating a deadlock. Contrarily, uncoordinated transport is slow and frequently becomes deadlocked. This study assessed the characteristics of uncoordinated cooperative transport, which has scarcely been studied before, through experiments performed on Formica japonica. Based on our experiment and analysis, we report that the transport speed remains unchanged with the number of transporters. We also found that pulling transporter ants often left the food item transiently as the transport speed decreased, and then went back to the item. Upon rejoining transport, the transport speed increased. This is presumably because the ants gain navigation information during the period that they leave the food. We propose that this ‘route reassessment’ behavior is important for transport coordination and navigation in F. japonica.
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McCreery HF, Bilek J, Nagpal R, Breed MD. Effects of load mass and size on cooperative transport in ants over multiple transport challenges. ACTA ACUST UNITED AC 2019; 222:jeb.206821. [PMID: 31395679 DOI: 10.1242/jeb.206821] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.2] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/09/2019] [Accepted: 08/02/2019] [Indexed: 11/20/2022]
Abstract
Some ant species cooperatively transport a wide range of extremely large, heavy food objects of various shapes and materials. While previous studies have examined how object mass and size affect the recruitment of additional workers, less is understood about how these attributes affect the rest of the transport process. Using artificial baits with independently varying mass and size, we reveal their effects on cooperative transport in Paratrechina longicornis across two transport challenges: movement initiation and obstacle navigation. As expected, object mass was tightly correlated with number of porters as workers adjust group size to the task. Mass affected performance similarly across the two challenges, with groups carrying heavy objects having lower performance. Yet, object size had differing effects depending on the challenge. While larger objects led to reduced performance during movement initiation - groups took longer to start moving these objects and had lower velocities - there was no evidence for this during obstacle navigation, and the opposite pattern was weakly supported. If a group struggles to start moving an object, it does not necessarily predict difficulty navigating around obstacles; groups should persist in trying to move 'difficult' objects, which may be easier to transport later in the process. Additionally, groups hitting obstacles were not substantially disrupted, and started moving again sooner than at the start, despite the nest direction being blocked. Paratrechina longicornis transport groups never failed, performing well at both challenges while carrying widely varying objects, and even transported a bait weighing 1900 times the mass of an individual.
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Affiliation(s)
- Helen F McCreery
- School of Engineering and Applied Sciences, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA 02138, USA
| | - Jenna Bilek
- Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, University of Colorado, Boulder, CO 80309, USA
| | - Radhika Nagpal
- School of Engineering and Applied Sciences, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA 02138, USA.,Wyss Institute, Harvard University, Boston, MA 02115, USA
| | - Michael D Breed
- Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, University of Colorado, Boulder, CO 80309, USA
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van Oudenhove L, Cerdá X, Bernstein C. Dominance-discovery and discovery-exploitation trade-offs promote diversity in ant communities. PLoS One 2018; 13:e0209596. [PMID: 30596700 PMCID: PMC6312297 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0209596] [Citation(s) in RCA: 5] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 10/15/2018] [Accepted: 12/09/2018] [Indexed: 12/01/2022] Open
Abstract
In ant communities, species coexist by using different foraging strategies. We developed an adaptive dynamics model to gain a better understanding of the factors that promote the emergence and maintenance of strategy diversity. We analysed the consequences of both interspecific competition and resource distribution for the evolutionary dynamics of social foraging in ants. The evolution of social foraging behaviour was represented using a stochastic mutation-selection process involving interactions among colonies. In our theoretical community, ant colonies inhabit an environment where resources are limited, and only one resource type is present. Colony interactions depend on colony-specific foraging strategies (defined as the degree of collective foraging), resource distribution patterns, and the degree of competition asymmetry. At the ecological timescale, we have created a model of foraging processes that reflects trade-offs between resource discovery and resource exploitation and between resource discovery and ant behavioural dominance. At the evolutionary timescale, we have identified the conditions of competition and resource distribution that can lead to the emergence and coexistence of both collective and individual foraging strategies. We suggest that asymmetric competition is an essential component in the emergence of diverse foraging strategies in a sympatric ant community.
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Affiliation(s)
- Louise van Oudenhove
- Université Côte d’Azur, INRA, CNRS, ISA, France
- Estación Biológica de Doñana, CSIC, Sevilla, Spain
- Université de Lyon, Université Claude Bernard Lyon 1, CNRS, Laboratoire de Biométrie et Biologie Evolutive, Villeurbanne, France
| | - Xim Cerdá
- Estación Biológica de Doñana, CSIC, Sevilla, Spain
| | - Carlos Bernstein
- Université de Lyon, Université Claude Bernard Lyon 1, CNRS, Laboratoire de Biométrie et Biologie Evolutive, Villeurbanne, France
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Buffin A, Sasaki T, Pratt SC. Scaling of speed with group size in cooperative transport by the ant Novomessor cockerelli. PLoS One 2018; 13:e0205400. [PMID: 30300423 PMCID: PMC6177163 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0205400] [Citation(s) in RCA: 7] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.2] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/24/2018] [Accepted: 09/25/2018] [Indexed: 11/18/2022] Open
Abstract
Working together allows social animals to accomplish tasks beyond the abilities of solitary individuals, but the benefits of cooperation must be balanced with the costs of coordination. Many ant species form cooperative groups to transport items too large for a single ant. However, transport by groups is often slower and less efficient than that of lone ants, for reasons that remain poorly understood. We tested the hypothesis that groups are slower when porters must encircle the load to carry it, because this arrangement places ants in a variety of postures relative to the load and the direction of travel. Porters may therefore have difficulty maximizing individual forces and aligning them with those of other group members. Experiments on the desert ant Novomessor cockerelli, an adept cooperative transporter, did not support this hypothesis. Groups ranging in size from one to four ants were induced to carry loads such that all porters were aligned with one another. Load weight was adjusted so that all porters pulled the same per capita weight, but lone porters were nonetheless faster than groups of any size. As group size increased, porters persisted in carrying the load for longer periods before letting go. We used simulations to explore a scenario in which ants vary in their intrinsic speed and the group's speed is limited by that of its slowest member. This proposed mechanism is analogous to other social groups where group efficiency is determined by the weakest link. We discuss how interactions among porters, mediated by the load itself, might explain such a constraint.
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Affiliation(s)
- Aurélie Buffin
- Mesa Community College, Mesa, Arizona, United States of America
| | - Takao Sasaki
- Odum School of Ecology, University of Georgia, Athens, Georgia, United States of America
| | - Stephen C. Pratt
- School of Life Sciences, Arizona State University, Tempe, Arizona, United States of America
- * E-mail:
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Bouchebti S, Travaglini RV, Forti LC, Fourcassié V. Dynamics of physical trail construction and of trail usage in the leaf-cutting ant Atta laevigata. ETHOL ECOL EVOL 2018. [DOI: 10.1080/03949370.2018.1503197] [Citation(s) in RCA: 2] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 10/28/2022]
Affiliation(s)
- Sofia Bouchebti
- Centre de Recherches sur la Cognition Animale, Centre de Biologie Intégrative, Université de Toulouse, CNRS, UPS, Toulouse 31062, France
| | - Raphael Vacchi Travaglini
- Laboratorio de Insetos Sociais Pragas, UNESP, Faculdade de Ciências Agrònomica de Botucatu, Departamento de Produção Vegetal, Fazenda Experimental Lageado, P.O. Box 237, 18610-307 Botucatu, SP, Brazil
| | - Luiz Carlos Forti
- Laboratorio de Insetos Sociais Pragas, UNESP, Faculdade de Ciências Agrònomica de Botucatu, Departamento de Produção Vegetal, Fazenda Experimental Lageado, P.O. Box 237, 18610-307 Botucatu, SP, Brazil
| | - Vincent Fourcassié
- Centre de Recherches sur la Cognition Animale, Centre de Biologie Intégrative, Université de Toulouse, CNRS, UPS, Toulouse 31062, France
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Campos D, Bartumeus F, Méndez V, Andrade JS, Espadaler X. Variability in individual activity bursts improves ant foraging success. J R Soc Interface 2016; 13:20160856. [PMID: 27974578 PMCID: PMC5221534 DOI: 10.1098/rsif.2016.0856] [Citation(s) in RCA: 12] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 10/25/2016] [Accepted: 11/22/2016] [Indexed: 11/12/2022] Open
Abstract
Using experimental and computational methods, we study the role of behavioural variability in activity bursts (or temporal activity patterns) for individual and collective regulation of foraging in A. senilis ants. First, foraging experiments were carried out under special conditions (low densities of ants and food and absence of external cues or stimuli) where individual-based strategies are most prevalent. By using marked individuals and recording all foraging trajectories, we were then able to precisely quantify behavioural variability among individuals. Our main conclusions are that (i) variability of ant trajectories (turning angles, speed, etc.) is low compared with variability of temporal activity profiles, and (ii) this variability seems to be driven by plasticity of individual behaviour through time, rather than the presence of fixed behavioural stereotypes or specialists within the group. The statistical measures obtained from these experimental foraging patterns are then used to build a general agent-based model (ABM) which includes the most relevant properties of ant foraging under natural conditions, including recruitment through pheromone communication. Using the ABM, we are able to provide computational evidence that the characteristics of individual variability observed in our experiments can provide a functional advantage (in terms of foraging success) to the group; thus, we propose the biological basis underpinning our observations. Altogether, our study reveals the potential utility of experiments under simplified (laboratory) conditions for understanding information-gathering in biological systems.
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Affiliation(s)
- Daniel Campos
- Grup de Física Estadística, Departament de Física. Facultat de Ciències, Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, 08193 Bellaterra (Barcelona), Spain
| | - Frederic Bartumeus
- Centre de Recerca en Ecologia i Aplicacions Forestals (CREAF), Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, 08193 Bellaterra (Barcelona), Spain
- Theoretical and Computational Ecology Lab (CEAB-CSIC), Blanes 17300, Spain
- Institució Catalana de Recerca i Estudis Avançats (ICREA), 08010 Barcelona, Spain
| | - Vicenç Méndez
- Grup de Física Estadística, Departament de Física. Facultat de Ciències, Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, 08193 Bellaterra (Barcelona), Spain
| | - José S Andrade
- Departamento de Física, Universidade Federal do Ceará, 60451-970, Fortaleza, Ceará, Brazil
| | - Xavier Espadaler
- Centre de Recerca en Ecologia i Aplicacions Forestals (CREAF), Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, 08193 Bellaterra (Barcelona), Spain
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Blight O, Villalta I, Cerdá X, Boulay R. Personality traits are associated with colony productivity in the gypsy ant Aphaenogaster senilis. Behav Ecol Sociobiol 2016. [DOI: 10.1007/s00265-016-2224-x] [Citation(s) in RCA: 11] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.4] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 02/05/2023]
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22
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Bernadou A, Felden A, Moreau M, Moretto P, Fourcassié V. Ergonomics of load transport in the seed harvesting ant Messor barbarus: morphology influences transportation method and efficiency. ACTA ACUST UNITED AC 2016; 219:2920-2927. [PMID: 27436140 DOI: 10.1242/jeb.141556] [Citation(s) in RCA: 12] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 04/20/2016] [Accepted: 07/10/2016] [Indexed: 11/20/2022]
Abstract
We studied in the field the load transport behavior of workers of the polymorphic Mediterranean seed harvester ant Messor barbarus Individual ants used two different methods to transport food items: carrying and dragging. The probability of dragging instead of carrying varied significantly with both the mass of the item transported and its linear dimension. Moreover, the values of item mass and length at which dragging began to occur increased with increasing size of the workers. However, larger ants began dragging at decreasing values of the relative mass represented by the items transported, which reflects different biomechanical constraints resulting from allometric relationships between the different parts of their body. Transport rate was significantly higher in large ants but varied in the same way for workers of different sizes with the relative mass of the item transported. Nevertheless, although large ants were individually more efficient than small ants in transporting food items, the relative transport rate, defined as the ratio of transport rate to the mass of the ant, was higher for small ants than for large ants. Colonies should thus have a greater benefit in investing in small ants than in large ants for the transport of food items. This may explain why the proportion of large ants is so small on the foraging columns of M. barbarus and why large ants are most often employed in colonies for tasks other than transporting food items.
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Affiliation(s)
- Abel Bernadou
- Research Center on Animal Cognition (CRCA), Center for Integrative Biology (CBI), Toulouse University, CNRS, UPS, Toulouse 31062, France
| | - Antoine Felden
- Research Center on Animal Cognition (CRCA), Center for Integrative Biology (CBI), Toulouse University, CNRS, UPS, Toulouse 31062, France
| | - Mathieu Moreau
- Research Center on Animal Cognition (CRCA), Center for Integrative Biology (CBI), Toulouse University, CNRS, UPS, Toulouse 31062, France
| | - Pierre Moretto
- Research Center on Animal Cognition (CRCA), Center for Integrative Biology (CBI), Toulouse University, CNRS, UPS, Toulouse 31062, France
| | - Vincent Fourcassié
- Research Center on Animal Cognition (CRCA), Center for Integrative Biology (CBI), Toulouse University, CNRS, UPS, Toulouse 31062, France
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Caut S, Barroso Á, Cerdá X, Amor F, Boulay RR. A year in an ant's life: Opportunism and seasonal variation in the foraging ecology ofAphaenogaster senilis. ECOSCIENCE 2015. [DOI: 10.2980/20-1-3559] [Citation(s) in RCA: 12] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/06/2022]
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24
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Blight O, Albet Díaz-Mariblanca G, Cerdá X, Boulay R. A proactive–reactive syndrome affects group success in an ant species. Behav Ecol 2015. [DOI: 10.1093/beheco/arv127] [Citation(s) in RCA: 40] [Impact Index Per Article: 4.4] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 01/22/2023] Open
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Santana AFK, McClure M, Ethier J, Despland E. Exploration costs promote conservative collective foraging in the social caterpillar Malacosoma disstria. Anim Behav 2015. [DOI: 10.1016/j.anbehav.2015.04.022] [Citation(s) in RCA: 5] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.6] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 10/23/2022]
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26
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Bhattacharya K, Vicsek T. Collective foraging in heterogeneous landscapes. J R Soc Interface 2014; 11:20140674. [PMID: 25165596 PMCID: PMC4191093 DOI: 10.1098/rsif.2014.0674] [Citation(s) in RCA: 29] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.9] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/25/2014] [Accepted: 08/01/2014] [Indexed: 11/12/2022] Open
Abstract
Animals foraging alone are hypothesized to optimize the encounter rates with resources through Lévy walks. However, the issue of how the interactions between multiple foragers influence their search efficiency is still not completely understood. To address this, we consider a model to study the optimal strategy for a group of foragers searching for targets distributed heterogeneously. In our model, foragers move on a square lattice containing immobile but regenerative targets. At any instant, a forager is able to detect only those targets that happen to be in the same site. However, we allow the foragers to have information about the state of other foragers. A forager who has not detected any target walks towards the nearest location, where another forager has detected a target, with a probability exp(-αd), where d is the distance between the foragers and α is a parameter characterizing the propensity of the foragers to aggregate. The model reveals that neither overcrowding (α → 0) nor independent searching (α → ∞) is beneficial for the foragers. For a patchy distribution of targets, the efficiency is maximum for intermediate values of α. In addition, in the limit α → 0, the length of the walks can become scale-free.
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Affiliation(s)
- Kunal Bhattacharya
- Department of Physics, Birla Institute of Technology and Science, Pilani, Rajasthan 333031, India
| | - Tamás Vicsek
- Department of Biological Physics, Eötvös University, Pázmány Péter sétány 1A, 1117 Budapest, Hungary
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Collignon B, Cervantes Valdivieso LE, Detrain C. Group recruitment in ants: who is willing to lead? Behav Processes 2014; 108:98-104. [PMID: 25307781 DOI: 10.1016/j.beproc.2014.09.033] [Citation(s) in RCA: 3] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/22/2013] [Revised: 09/02/2014] [Accepted: 09/26/2014] [Indexed: 10/24/2022]
Abstract
In social species, food exploitation is a challenging cooperative task that requires communication and coordination with some individuals that are more influential in the final foraging process. Among recruiters of the ant Tetramorium caespitum that have discovered food, some individuals act as leaders that physically guide groups of recruits until they reach the food source. Here, we discovered that highly motivated recruiters that focus their recruiting activity on areas close to the nest entrance and that perform a high number of contacts with nestmates in a short period of time are more likely to lead a group of followers on their next foraging trip. Based on the individual tracking of recruiters, we also show that the probability to lead a group is homogeneously distributed and that no specialisation into leadership occurs even over successive foraging trips. Instead of a permanent leadership, a distributed leadership that is mainly based on the motivation level of recruiters appears as an efficient way to process information and make collective decisions. Finally, we discuss how heterogeneity among group members in their access to information, their motivation to recruit or the social context of recruitment can be coupled to self-organising processes and can ultimately lead to adaptive collective patterns.
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Affiliation(s)
- Bertrand Collignon
- Service d'Ecologie Sociale CP. 231, Université Libre de Bruxelles, Boulevard du Triomphe, 1050 Brussels, Belgium.
| | | | - Claire Detrain
- Service d'Ecologie Sociale CP. 231, Université Libre de Bruxelles, Boulevard du Triomphe, 1050 Brussels, Belgium.
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Boulay R, Arnan X, Cerdá X, Retana J. The ecological benefits of larger colony size may promote polygyny in ants. J Evol Biol 2014; 27:2856-63. [PMID: 25302869 DOI: 10.1111/jeb.12515] [Citation(s) in RCA: 32] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.2] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/18/2014] [Revised: 09/15/2014] [Accepted: 09/17/2014] [Indexed: 11/29/2022]
Abstract
How polygyny evolved in social insect societies is a long-standing question. This phenomenon, which is functionally similar to communal breeding in vertebrates, occurs when several queens come together in the same nest to lay eggs that are raised by workers. As a consequence, polygyny drastically reduces genetic relatedness among nestmates. It has been suggested that the short-term benefits procured by group living may outweigh the costs of sharing the same nesting site and thus contribute to organisms rearing unrelated individuals. However, tests of this hypothesis are still limited. To examine the evolutionary emergence of polygyny, we reviewed the literature to build a data set containing life-history traits for 149 Palearctic ant species and combined this data set with a reconstructed phylogeny. We show that monogyny is the ancestral state and that polygyny has evolved secondarily and independently throughout the phylogenetic tree. The occurrence of polygyny is significantly correlated with larger colony size, dependent colony founding and ecological dominance. Although polydomy (when a colony simultaneously uses several connected nests) tends to occur more frequently in polygynous species, this trend is not significant when phylogenetic history is accounted for. Overall, our results indicate that polygyny may have evolved in ants in spite of the reduction in nestmate relatedness because large colony size provides immediate ecological advantages, such as the more efficient use of temporal food resources. We suggest that the competitive context of ant communities may have provided the conditions necessary for the evolution of polygyny in some clades.
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Affiliation(s)
- R Boulay
- Departamento de Zoología, Universidad de Granada, Granada, Spain; IRBI, UMR CNRS 7261, Université François Rabelais de Tours, Tours, France
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29
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Cerdá X, van Oudenhove L, Bernstein C, Boulay RR. A List of and Some Comments about the Trail Pheromones of Ants. Nat Prod Commun 2014. [DOI: 10.1177/1934578x1400900813] [Citation(s) in RCA: 3] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/15/2022] Open
Abstract
Ants use many different chemical compounds to communicate with their nestmates. Foraging success depends on how efficiently ants communicate the presence of food and thus recruit workers to exploit the food resource. Trail pheromones, produced by different exocrine glands, are a key part of ant foraging strategies. By combing through the literature, we compiled a list of the identity and glandular origin of the chemical compounds found in the trail pheromones of 75 different ant species. Of the 168 compounds identified, more than 40% are amines. In the subfamily Myrmicinae, trail pheromones are mostly produced in the venom gland, while in the subfamily Formicinae, they come from the rectal gland.
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Affiliation(s)
- Xim Cerdá
- Department of Ethology and Biodiversity Conservation, Estación Biológica de Doñana, CSIC, E-41092 Sevilla, Spain
| | - Louise van Oudenhove
- Department of Ethology and Biodiversity Conservation, Estación Biológica de Doñana, CSIC, E-41092 Sevilla, Spain
- Laboratoire de Biométrie et Biologie Évolutive, CNRS, UMR5558, Université de Lyon1, F-69622 Villeurbanne, France
- INRA, UMR 1355, Institut Sophia Agrobiotech, 400 Route des Chappes, F-06903 Sophia Antipolis, France
| | - Carlos Bernstein
- Laboratoire de Biométrie et Biologie Évolutive, CNRS, UMR5558, Université de Lyon1, F-69622 Villeurbanne, France
| | - Raphaël R. Boulay
- Department of Ethology and Biodiversity Conservation, Estación Biológica de Doñana, CSIC, E-41092 Sevilla, Spain
- IRBI, UMR CNRS 7261, Université François Rabelais de Tours, Parc de Grandmont, F-37200 Tours, France
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30
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Collignon B, Detrain C. Accuracy of leadership and control of the audience in the pavement ant Tetramorium caespitum. Anim Behav 2014. [DOI: 10.1016/j.anbehav.2014.03.026] [Citation(s) in RCA: 7] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/28/2022]
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Campos D, Bartumeus F, Méndez V, Espadaler X. Reorientation patterns in central-place foraging: internal clocks and klinokinesis. J R Soc Interface 2013; 11:20130859. [PMID: 24152814 DOI: 10.1098/rsif.2013.0859] [Citation(s) in RCA: 12] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.1] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/12/2022] Open
Abstract
We study central-place foraging patterns of Aphaenogaster senilis ants at a population level by video framing individual ant trajectories in a circular arena with a nest connected to its centre. The ants naturally leave and enter the nest and forage generating non-trivial movement patterns around the nest. Our data analysis indicated that the trajectories observed can be classified into two strategies: the risk-averse strategy, which involves wandering around the nest without departing far from it and the risk-prone strategy, which involves long exploration paths with periodic returns to the central region, nearby the nest. We found that both risk-prone and risk-averse strategies exhibit qualitatively the same reorientation patterns, with the time between consecutive reorientations covering a wide range of scales, and fitting a stretched exponential function. Nevertheless, differences in the temporal scales and the time variability of such reorientation events differ, together with other aspects of motion, such as average speed and turns. Our results give experimental evidence that the internal mechanisms driving reorientations in ants tend to favour frequently long relocations, as theory predicts for efficient exploration in patchy landscapes, but ants engaged in central-place foraging can modulate such behaviour to control distances from the nest. Previous works on the species support the idea that risk-prone and risk-averse strategies may reflect actual differences between individuals age and experience; these factors (age and experience) should be then relevant in modulating the internal reorientation clocks. To support the validity of our findings, we develop a random-walk model combining stretched exponential reorientation clocks with klinokinesis that fits the time length and the travelled distance distributions of the observed trajectories.
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Affiliation(s)
- Daniel Campos
- Grup de Fsica Estadstica, Departament de Fsica, Facultat de Ciències, Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, , 08193 Bellaterra (Barcelona), Spain
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Czaczkes TJ, Vollet-Neto A, Ratnieks FLW. Prey escorting behavior and possible convergent evolution of foraging recruitment mechanisms in an invasive ant. Behav Ecol 2013. [DOI: 10.1093/beheco/art046] [Citation(s) in RCA: 17] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/14/2022] Open
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McClure M, Morcos L, Despland E. Collective choice of a higher-protein food source by gregarious caterpillars occurs through differences in exploration. Behav Ecol 2012. [DOI: 10.1093/beheco/ars141] [Citation(s) in RCA: 8] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/14/2022] Open
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Substrate Temperature Constrains Recruitment and Trail Following Behavior in Ants. J Chem Ecol 2012; 38:802-9. [DOI: 10.1007/s10886-012-0130-x] [Citation(s) in RCA: 22] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/29/2012] [Revised: 04/10/2012] [Accepted: 04/24/2012] [Indexed: 10/28/2022]
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Worker size-related task partitioning in the foraging strategy of a seed-harvesting ant species. Behav Ecol Sociobiol 2011. [DOI: 10.1007/s00265-011-1197-z] [Citation(s) in RCA: 20] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/26/2022]
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Angulo E, Caut S, Cerdá X. Scavenging in Mediterranean ecosystems: effect of the invasive Argentine ant. Biol Invasions 2011. [DOI: 10.1007/s10530-011-9953-6] [Citation(s) in RCA: 17] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/24/2022]
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Witte V, Schliessmann D, Hashim R. Attack or call for help? Rapid individual decisions in a group-hunting ant. Behav Ecol 2010. [DOI: 10.1093/beheco/arq100] [Citation(s) in RCA: 14] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/13/2022] Open
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Martínez-Duro E, Ferrandis P, Herranz JM, Copete MA. Do seed harvesting ants threaten the viability of a critically endangered non-myrmecochorous perennial plant population? A complex interaction. POPUL ECOL 2010. [DOI: 10.1007/s10144-010-0195-8] [Citation(s) in RCA: 5] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.4] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 10/19/2022]
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Collignon B, Detrain C. Distributed leadership and adaptive decision-making in the ant Tetramorium caespitum. Proc Biol Sci 2009; 277:1267-73. [PMID: 20031990 DOI: 10.1098/rspb.2009.1976] [Citation(s) in RCA: 27] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/12/2022] Open
Abstract
In the ant species Tetramorium caespitum, communication and foraging patterns rely on group-mass recruitment. Scouts having discovered food recruit nestmates and behave as leaders by guiding groups of recruits to the food location. After a while, a mass recruitment takes place in which foragers follow a chemical trail. Since group recruitment is crucial to the whole foraging process, we investigated whether food characteristics induce a tuning of recruiting stimuli by leaders that act upon the dynamics and size of recruited groups. High sucrose concentration triggers the exit of a higher number of groups that contain twice as many ants and reach the food source twice as fast than towards a weakly concentrated one. Similar trends were found depending on food accessibility: for a cut mealworm, accessibility to haemolymph results in a faster formation of larger groups than for an entire mealworm. These data provide the background for developing a stochastic model accounting for exploitation patterns by group-mass recruiting species. This model demonstrates how the modulations performed by leaders drive the colony to select the most profitable food source among several ones. Our results highlight how a minority of individuals can influence collective decisions in societies based on a distributed leadership.
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Affiliation(s)
- B Collignon
- Service d'Ecologie Sociale CP. 231, Université Libre de Bruxelles, Campus Plaine, Boulevard du Triomphe 1050, Brussels, Belgium.
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Tarapore D, Floreano D, Keller L. Task-dependent influence of genetic architecture and mating frequency on division of labour in social insect societies. Behav Ecol Sociobiol 2009. [DOI: 10.1007/s00265-009-0885-4] [Citation(s) in RCA: 17] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.1] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/24/2022]
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