Ants never cease to set great examples of cooperation and perseverance.
While this social insect does not have enough tools, and despite the fragility of its body;
Except that they build unique housing.
A recent study on the website of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, to be published in the magazine's February 2 issue, sheds light on the way these skilled builders are building their intricate mounds.
The mounds that termites build have astonished scientists for decades.
However, scientists at "John A. Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences" of Harvard University have recently been able to develop a mathematical model that enables them to predict the method. These are built in complex buildings.
According to the press release published by the university, El Mahadevan, professor of applied mathematics, evolutionary biology and physics and lead of the study, believes that termite mounds are among "the finest examples of architecture on the planet."
However, scientists do not know how these mounds were built, or the mechanism by which they operate, or the purpose of building them in this way.
Common lands and built hills
In a previous study conducted by the same team, they found that the contrast in morning and evening temperatures leads to the flow of air currents through these hills.
This ultimately allows the hills to be ventilated and the transfer of pheromones (which are organic compounds that move from one organism to another - especially insects - through the air in very small quantities) as signals between ant colonies, which in turn stimulate building activities within termite colonies;
Ants build their individual colonies, which connect to common grounds among themselves.
In the current study, the team investigated how termites build the floors and floors of these hills, as well as the slopes that connect them.
Initially, the researchers collaborated with scientists from the University of Toulouse, France, to map the internal structures of two of these hills using tomography.
This enabled them to determine the spacing and arrangement of floors and slopes.
However, the most exciting thing was how these multiple floors were connected, as scientists observed that ants build simple slopes to connect the floors together, and they also construct slope-like spiral corridors that connect multi-storey car garages.
The team then used their previous findings such as temperature contrast, as well as pheromone signals.
To build a mathematical model that enables them to predict the shape of these hills.
Multi-storey ant dwellings and the connecting slopes (uric alt)
Mutual effect
The team believes that the components of these hills, as well as the places where termites are found within the hills, vary with time and place.
This is what Alexander Heide, the first author of the study, explains, saying, “Colonies contain hundreds of thousands of ants, which sense the surrounding environment, and then respond to it. When the air currents that cross the hills move, they transmit signals with them, which push the ants to Adopting a new behavior. "
However, the ants change the shape of these colonies from the inside, moving the mud from one place to another, and then changing the way in which pheromones travel.
The team’s mathematical model was able to “predict the spacing between floors, as well as predict where linear slopes and spiral paths connect between floors,” says Heidi.
Hence, this study links the environment, the behavioral aspect, and the physical analgesic changes.
What Mahadevan describes, "Insects adopt their appropriate habitat in response to pheromone concentrations, as this physical change in the habitat is followed by a change in the flow of pheromones, so the behavior of the ants change accordingly. Consequently, the physical structure of the dwelling and the biology of the organism are affected and influence its behavior."