INVESTIGADORES
JOSENS Roxana Beatriz
artículos
Título:
Antennation of nectar-receivers encodes colony needs and food-source profitability in the ant Camponotus mus
Autor/es:
SOFÍA MC CABE, WALTER M. FARINA & ROXANA JOSENS
Revista:
INSECTES SOCIAUX
Editorial:
Birkhäuser Verlag
Referencias:
Lugar: Basel; Año: 2006 vol. 53 p. 356 - 361
ISSN:
0020-1812
Resumen:
Abstract. In social insects, interactions among individuals
are important in colony organisation because they can be used
in decision making. During trophallaxis in ants, antennal and
foreleg contacts between both partners are established. It has
been suggested that a modulatory communication channel
could be involved in such contacts, but it remains undemonstrated.
The aim of this work was to find variables plausible
to be encoded in such contacts and quantify the consequent
changes in the tactile stimulation the food-donor ant receives.
We recorded nectar transference between pairs of workers in
experimental arenas once one of them had returned from collecting
sucrose solution (15 or 40 % w/w), with different situations
of colonys sugar deprivation. The frequency of antennal
strokes that the food-donor ant received on her head
depended on both the colonys sugar-deprivation and the concentration,
the latter showed differences within 35 deprivation
days. Antennal and foreleg movements of the food-receiver
increase with increasing level of colonys carbohydrate
deprivation, as well as with increasing concentration of the
transferred food. Not only does this study reopen an interesting
question, but it gives evidence that variables related to the
appetitive context are indeed encoded in the tactile stimulation
during the trophallaxis as well. Consequently, they have
the effective potentiality to play a communicational role in
the organization of colony activities.