sequential load transport in grass-cutting ants (atta vollenweideri) maximization of plant delivery rate or improved information transfer顺序负载运输切草蚂蚁(阿塔vollenweideri)工厂交货率最大化或改进的信息传递.pdfVIP

Hindawi Publishing Corporation Psyche Volume 2011, Article ID 643127, 10 pages doi:10.1155/2011/643127 Research Article Sequential Load Transport in Grass-Cutting Ants (Atta vollenweideri ): Maximization of Plant Delivery Rate or Improved Information Transfer? ¨ Jacqueline Roschard and Flavio Roces Department of Behavioral Physiology and Sociobiology (Zoology II), Biocenter, University of Wurzburg, Am Hubland, ¨ 97074 Wurzburg, Germany ¨ Correspondence should be addressed to Flavio Roces, roces@biozentrum.uni-wuerzburg.de Received 7 March 2011; Accepted 14 April 2011 ´ ´ Academic Editor: Felipe Andres Leon Contrera ¨ Copyright © 2011 J. Roschard and F. Roces. This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. Sequential transport of plant fragments was studied in the grass-cutting ant Atta vollenweideri . Two competing hypotheses concerning its occurrence were tested. Based on the “economic-transport hypothesis,” sequential transport occurs because of a mismatch between load size and ant body size, and it is therefore considered a way to improve size-matching and so the plant delivery rate. Alternatively, the “information-transfer hypothesis” states that sequential transport improves the information flow during foraging. By transferring its load, a worker may return earlier to the foraging site so as to intensify chemical recruitment. To distinguish between the