Information Processing in Social Insect Networks

Waters, James S.; Fewell, Jennifer H.

doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0040337

Cited by 97 publications

(79 citation statements)

References 30 publications

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“…It has been shown, both by theory and experiment, that the feed-forward loop performs signal processing tasks such as persistence detection, pulse generation and acceleration of transcription responses [53,55,56]. The same signature found in the antennation networks of the seed harvester ant P. californicus while engaged in foraging activities also suggests a functional similarity and selection for efficiency of directional information flow [27]. Remarkably, we did not find any such pattern in the antennation networks of R. marginata (electronic supplementary material, text S5).…”

Section: The Feed-forward Loopmentioning

confidence: 86%

Social insect colony as a biological regulatory system: modelling information flow in dominance networks

Nandi

Annagiri

Bhattacharya

2014

J. R. Soc. Interface.

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Social insects provide an excellent platform to investigate flow of information in regulatory systems since their successful social organization is essentially achieved by effective information transfer through complex connectivity patterns among the colony members. Network representation of such behavioural interactions offers a powerful tool for structural as well as dynamical analysis of the underlying regulatory systems. In this paper, we focus on the dominance interaction networks in the tropical social wasp Ropalidia marginata-a species where behavioural observations indicate that such interactions are principally responsible for the transfer of information between individuals about their colony needs, resulting in a regulation of their own activities. Our research reveals that the dominance networks of R. marginata are structurally similar to a class of naturally evolved information processing networks, a fact confirmed also by the predominance of a specific substructure-the 'feed-forward loop'-a key functional component in many other information transfer networks. The dynamical analysis through Boolean modelling confirms that the networks are sufficiently stable under small fluctuations and yet capable of more efficient information transfer compared to their randomized counterparts. Our results suggest the involvement of a common structural design principle in different biological regulatory systems and a possible similarity with respect to the effect of selection on the organization levels of such systems. The findings are also consistent with the hypothesis that dominance behaviour has been shaped by natural selection to co-opt the information transfer process in such social insect species, in addition to its primal function of mediation of reproductive competition in the colony.

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Section: The Feed-forward Loopmentioning

confidence: 86%

Social insect colony as a biological regulatory system: modelling information flow in dominance networks

Nandi

Annagiri

Bhattacharya

2014

J. R. Soc. Interface.

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“…The video acquisition system, previously described [66], enabled repeat recording of high-quality uncompressed AVI video (2024 Â 2024 pixels; 15 frames per second). Walking speeds of ants in a colony were estimated by manual tracking of all of the visibly moving ants within segments of video (30 s) which were recorded during the respirometry measurements [67,68].…”

Section: (E) Colony Activitymentioning

confidence: 99%

Differentiating causality and correlation in allometric scaling: ant colony size drives metabolic hypometry

et al. 2017

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Metabolic rates of individual animals and social insect colonies generally scale hypometrically, with mass-specific metabolic rates decreasing with increasing size. Although this allometry has wide ranging effects on social behaviour, ecology and evolution, its causes remain controversial. Because it is difficult to experimentally manipulate body size of organisms, most studies of metabolic scaling depend on correlative data, limiting their ability to determine causation. To overcome this limitation, we experimentally reduced the size of harvester ant colonies (Pogonomyrmex californicus) and quantified the consequent increase in mass-specific metabolic rates. Our results clearly demonstrate a causal relationship between colony size and hypometric changes in metabolic rate that could not be explained by changes in physical density. These findings provide evidence against prominent models arguing that the hypometric scaling of metabolic rate is primarily driven by constraints on resource delivery or surface area/volume ratios, because colonies were provided with excess food and colony size does not affect individual oxygen or nutrient transport. We found that larger colonies had lower median walking speeds and relatively more stationary ants and including walking speed as a variable in the mass-scaling allometry greatly reduced the amount of residual variation in the model, reinforcing the role of behaviour in metabolic allometry. Following the experimental size reduction, however, the proportion of stationary ants increased, demonstrating that variation in locomotory activity cannot solely explain hypometric scaling of metabolic rates in these colonies. Based on prior studies of this species, the increase in metabolic rate in sizereduced colonies could be due to increased anabolic processes associated with brood care and colony growth.

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“…C. pennsylvanicus is an ant species that has 35 evolved to nest inside dead trees; we mimicked this by maintaining colonies 36 inside wood under complete darkness. We focused on the oral exchange of food, 37 trophollaxis, as the key social interaction of interest because colonies must 38 balance efficient resource flow with mitigating disease spread (26) between individuals to the emergent, colony-wide properties that they produce 46 (27,28,29). Several network metrics are of particular relevance to disease 47 transmission, including degree and betweeness centrality.…”

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confidence: 99%