Myrmecology

Abstract

Animals often sustain injuries, which are susceptible to lethal infections. In social insects, wound care behaviours have evolved to reduce these risks. But the limits of wound care behaviours remain unclear. Here we investigated the wound care behaviours of the ant Camponotus maculatus. Our findings show that amputation of legs infected with Pseudomonas aeruginosa significantly reduced mortality. However, nestmates do not differentiate between infected and sterile injuries, providing similar treatments regardless of infection. Even though we show that early amputation correlates with higher survival rates, nestmates amputate indiscriminately on legs with fresh or old wounds. Additionally, cuticular hydrocarbon profiles differed between ants with infected or sterile wounds only 24 hours post-injury, a timepoint when amputations are no longer effective. We propose that C. maculatus workers perform prophylactic amputations regardless of injury state or age. This is in sharp contrast to previous studies which showed clear capabilities to treat infected wounds differently in ants using antimicrobial compounds. This work therefore shows the limits of wound care behaviours in social insects, allowing us to better understand the evolutionary drivers of this unique behaviour.

In this paper, they show how small insects reared in a very simple chamber can survive in it as long as insects that are kept in a more traditional enclosure.

The figure of their chamber with 10 nests is this one:

A hole is made to the bottom of a petri dish, a peice of plaster placed such that it covers the hole, and a piece of sponge is used to connect the plaster to a water reservoir underneath. The connection to the water reservoir ensures that the ants have continuous access to water through the moistened plaster, while preventing the ants from accidentally drowning. In the petri dish, there is also a dark plastic film that the ants can use for cover.

The paper shows that ants can do well in this easy-to-care for chamber, and so this type of chamber can be used for experimental observations.