Directed self-organization through thermoregulation in ant colonies*

The nest of social insects is a complex architecture housing a multitude of individuals in a highly structured hierarchical network. At the heart of each of these spontaneously organized colonies, are the brood. Given the great lengths that social insects invest in their nest design and the spatial fidelity that individuals present, it stands to reason that the location of brood may regulate the dynamics of the social network and in turn, influence division of labor. We aim to test this prediction in colonies of C. fellah by taking advantage of the inherent thermosensitivity of the colony members. We discovered that the workers repeatedly transport the brood to locations within a certain temperature range. We then developed a robotic heat regulation system that allows us, for the first time, to directly control the position of the brood pile within an ant colony by subtly altering fine thermal gradients under the nest surface floor, while simultaneously, gathering precise behavioral data for all individuals within the colony using automated visual tracking. Analysis of spatial and social interaction network reveals novel insight on how spatial reorganization within the colony drives changes in population dynamics and collective decision making.