The Third Annual Frontiers in Life Sciences Conference

SOCIAL BIOMIMICRY Insect Societies and Human Design

February 18 - 20, 2010Arizona State University - School Of Life Sciences

Memorial Union, Tempe Campus

Overview . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2-3

Acknowledgements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4-5

Guest Speaker Biographies . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6-9

Conference Organizers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10

Oral Presentation Abstracts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .12-21

Poster Abstracts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .22-35

TABLE OF CONTENTS

photo credit: Tomatito26 | Dreamstime Stock Photos photo credit: Peter Gronemann

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CONFERENCEOVERVIEW

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Biomimicry, also known as biomimetics or biologically inspired design, involves imitating nature‘s forms and processes to more effectively and sustainably meet design challenges . Although humans have always sought inspiration from natural systems, the use of biology as a design tool is becoming more formalized and is increasingly spurring innovation . The social insects (ants, bees, wasps, termites, etc .) are uniquely qualified to inform human design; they have evolved societies rivaled only by our own in scope and sophistication, and, through their collective behavior and nest achitecture, have solved many problems also faced by humans, from routing traffic to regulating climate . This conference brings together biologists, designers, engineers, and businesspeople, to promote an interdisciplinary exchange of con-cepts, perspectives, and tools that we hope will enrich biology and advance biomimetic design .

We have planned a variety of activities for the next three days . Each morning, our distinguished invited speakers will present their research and design programs in the context of biomimicry, followed by panel discussions that address common problem-oriented themes . Complexity scientist and business consultant Eric Bonabeau will deliver the keynote address . A poster session on Thursday evening will highlight basic and applied social insect research and biomimetic designs . Three working groups will meet daily, building upon specific examples to explore fundamental issues in biomimicry . And finally, we invite you to join us for the Social Insect Science EXPO!, a public event featuring live ants and bees and a presentation by insect wrangler and designer Ray Mendez .

We thank you for participating, and look forward to your contri-butions to the conference and to the field of social biomimicry . If you have questions at any point before, during, or after the conference, please don‘t hesitate to ask one of us . We hope that your experience here is stimulating, comfortable, and productive .

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BIOMIMICRY

“Social Biomimicry: Insect Societies and Human Design” would not have been possible without gener-ous support from the Research and Training Initiatives Office of the School of Life Sciences (SOLS), Arizona State University, as part of the Frontiers in Life Sci-ences (FiLS) Conference Series . FiLS awards up to $30,000 annually to SOLS graduate students and postdocs to host a conference that “showcases the interdisciplinary research of SOLS students and fac-ulty, connects that work with that of colleagues within and beyond ASU, and communicates the excitement of new discovery to students and the general public .” We are the third recipients of this grant . The first two FiLS conferences, “Iridescence: More than Meets the Eye” in 2008 and “Dynamic Deserts: Resource Uncertainty in Arid Environments” in 2009, set a high standard, and we are heavily indebted to the past organizers for their guidance . In addition, supplemental funding was provided by the ASU Graduate and Professional Stu-dent Association (GPSA) . Thank you .

The following people and organizations provided in-valuable technical and moral support:

Rhonda Chapman, SOLS Business Office Margaret Coulombe, SOLS Grant Proposal and Media Relations Anita Dubbs, SOLS Business Office James Elser, Associate Dean, SOLS Research and Training Initiatives Rachel Hayes, SOLS Business Office Charles Kazilek, SOLS Visualization Lab Joshua Mikel, Graphic Designer Tricia Quitmeyer, SOLS Business Office Jacob Mayfield, SOLS Visualization Lab Jacob Sahertian, SOLS Visualization Lab Center for Social Dynamics and Complexity InnovationSpace Social Insect Research Group

We also thank our invited speakers, who have been incredibly supportive and enthusiastic:

Tucker Balch, Thomas Knittel, Karsten Peters, Eric Bo-nabeau, Vijay Kumar, Stephen Pratt, Prasad Boradkar, Doug Lawson, Craig Tovey, Anna Dornhaus, Ilaria Maz-zoleni, Walter Tschinkel, Jennifer Fewell, Ray Mendez, Scott Turner, Nigel Franks, Martin Middendorf, Bert Hölldobler, Kevin Passino

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

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Dr. Tucker Balch is an Associate Profes-sor at Georgia Tech, in Interactive and Intelligent Computing . His research is focused on autonomous robots, so-cial animals and multi-robot teams . He co-edited the book Robot Teams: From Diversity to Polymorphism .

Prasad Boradkar (Opening Speaker) is an Associate Professor in Industrial Design at Arizona State University in Tempe . He holds degrees in industrial design and mechanical engineering . He is the Program Director of the Industrial De-sign program, Codirector and Founder of CriticalCorps, and the Director of Inno-vationSpace, a transdisciplinary labora-tory where students and faculty partner with researchers, inventors, businesses, and biologists to explore user-centered product concepts that improve society and the environment .

Dr. Eric Bonabeau (Keynote Speaker) is founder and Chief Scientist of Boston-based Icosystem Corporation . He is one of the world’s leading experts in complex systems and distributed adaptive prob-lem solving . He co-authored the books Swarm Intelligence and Self-Organization in Biological Systems . Dr . Bonabeau holds a Ph .D . in Theoretical Physics from Paris-Sud University in France .

Dr. Anna Dornhaus is an Assistant Professor in Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at the University of Arizona . Her main research interest is organization in groups, how collective behaviors emerge

from the actions and interactions of individuals . Her model systems include colonies of bumble bees, honey bees and ants .

Dr. Jennifer Fewell is a Professor at Arizona State University, in the School of Life Sciences . Her research addresses how task organization evolves within insect societies and how social groups function as self-organizing networks . She co-founded ASU‘s Center for Social Dynamics and Complexity, which lever-ages the emerging field of complex sys-tems to foster interdisciplinary research on fundamental questions of social life . She recently co-edited the book Organi-zation of Insect Societies: From Genome to Sociocomplexity .

Dr. Nigel Franks is a Professor of Bio-logical Sciences at the University of Bristol . His research focuses on collec-tive problem solving and the algorithmic basis of self organization in ants . He is a co-author of three books, The Behav-ioral Ecology of Ants, Social Evolution in Ants, and Self Organization in Biological Systems .

Dr. Bert Hölldobler (Opening Speaker) is behavioral biologist studying the evolu-tion of social organizations in insects, in particular the ants . He holds posi-tions at the University of Wuerzburg and Arizona State University, where he is a Foundation Professor in the School of Life Sciences . Dr . Hölldobler is a co-winner of the Pulitzer Prize for his work

GUESTSPEAKERS

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on The Ants with Edward O . Wilson . He and Wilson also co-authored Journey to the Ants and The Superorganism: The Beauty, Elegance, and Strangeness of In-sect Societies . He is an elected member of several Academies and the recipient of numerous honors .

Thomas Knittel is Design Principal and Sustainable Design Leader of the New York office of HOK, one of the world‘s largest architectural firms . He is a gradu-ate of the Harvard University Graduate School of Design .

Dr. Vijay Kumar is a UPS Foundation Professor and the Associate Dean for Academic Affairs in the School of En-gineering and Applied Science at the University of Pennsylvania . His research interests lie in the area of robotics and networked multi-agent systems . He co-authored the book Robotics: State of the Art and Future Challenges .

Dr. Doug Lawson is Manager of Process, Forecasting, and Simulations at South-west Airlines . He applies swarm intel-ligence models to improve efficiency and customer service .

Ilaria Mazzoleni is a faculty member at the Southern California Institute of Architecture . Over the last ten years, she has investigated issues of sustainable ar-chitecture and building technologies . Her later academic and professional research focuses on Biomimicry: Innovation in Architecture Inspired by Nature .

Raymond Mendez (EXPO Speaker) is the owner of an exhibit design, special ef-fects, and model making studio, Work As Play . He is also a Field Research Associ-ate in the Department of Entomology at the American Museum of Natural History . He is well known for his work in museum and zoo exhibit designs, specializing in live exhibits of eusocial animals . In addi-tion, he has had an illustrious career as an “insect wrangler” in the movie indus-try and as a designer for television and print ads .

Dr. Martin Middendorf is a Professor of Mathematics and Computer Science at the University of Leipzig . His research in-terests include nature inspired computing and collective behavior of social insects .

Dr. Kevin Passino is a Professor of Elec-trical and Computer Engineering at The Ohio State University . He conducts inter-disciplinary engineering-biology research on distributed control, decision-making and optimization for energy systems . He has written several books, including Biomimicry for Optimization, Control, and Automation .

Dr. Karsten Peters is a Professor in the Institute of Transport and Economics at Technische Universität Dresden . His research interests are applications of scientific methods to logistic systems, multi-agent systems and the dynamics of complex networks and systems .

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Dr. Stephen Pratt is an Assistant Pro-fessor in the School of Life Sciences at Arizona State University . He studies how the complex behavior of animal soci-eties emerges from the interactions of group members, despite the absence of any well-informed central controller . He focuses particularly on the rich examples found in ants, bees, and other social insects .

Dr. Craig Tovey is a Professor in the School of Industrial and Systems Engi-neering and in the College of Computing at Georgia Tech . His principal research and teaching activities are in optimiza-tion, probabilistic analysis, and natural systems .

Dr. Walter Tschinkel is a Robert O . Law-ton Distinguished Professor of Biological Science at The Florida State University . Among his research interests are the sociogenesis and population dynamics of ant colonies, as well as the nest archi-tecture of ground-nesting ants . He wrote the book The Fire Ants .

Dr. Scott Turner is a Professor in the Department of Environmental and Forest Biology at the State University of New York College of Environmental Science and Forestry . His research examines how assemblages of social insects, specif-ically termites, cooperate to produce “emergent physiology” at a scale much larger than the individuals in the colony . He wrote The Extended Organism: The Physiology of Animal-Built Structures .

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CONFERENCEORGANIZERS

Rebecca Clark (rebecca .m .clark@asu .edu) is a Ph .D . candidate in the School of Life Sciences, working with Dr . Jennifer Fewell . She studies the biological organization and behavior of social groups, specifically how behavior and nutrition influence ant colony growth .

Tate Holbrook (ctholbrook@asu .edu) is a Ph .D . candidate in the School of Life Sciences, working with Dr . Jennifer Fewell . He studies the behavioral ecology and evolution of insect societies . His dissertation examines the emergence of division of labor in incipient social groups, and effects of colony size on the organization of work and productivity in ants .

Dani Moore (dani .moore@asu .edu) is a Ph .D . student in the School of Life Sciences, working with Dr . Jürgen Liebig . Her research fo-cuses on communication and the orga-nization of social insect colonies . She is particularly interested in how communi-cation changes as a colony grows larger in size .

Rick Overson (rick .overson@asu .edu) is a Ph .D . student in the School of Life Sciences, working with Dr . Jürgen Gadau . His research fo-cuses on the evolution and maintenance of cooperation among unrelated queens in ant societies .

Clint Penick (clint .penick@asu .edu) is a Ph .D . student in the School of Life Sciences, work-ing with Dr . Jürgen Liebig . His current work focuses on conflict in ant societies, investigating the formation of dominance hierarchies and the regulation of queen development . He has also worked on nest architecture in fire ants, specifi-cally testing thermal properties of fire ant mounds .

Adrian Smith (adrian .smith@asu .edu) is a Ph .D . student in the School of Life Sciences, working with Dr . Jürgen Liebig . His dissertation focuses on communication and regula-tion of reproduction within ant societies . Adrian is currently a teaching assistant at InnovationSpace at the College of Design at ASU, working with senior level design, business, and engineering students that use biomimetic design principals to in-spire products that meet societal needs .

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ORAL PRESENTATION

ABSTRACTSTHE LEAFCUTTERS: CIVILIZATION BY INSTINCT. Bert Hölldobler, School of Life Sciences, Arizona State University, bertholl@asu .edu .

If a congress of naturalists were to gather to choose the Seven Wonders of the animal world, they would be compelled to include the bizarre and mighty civilizations of the attine leafcutters . Throughout the tropical and subtropical regions of the New World, they dominate the forests, grasslands, and pastures .

Leafcutter colonies can best be understood scientifically as complex organic structures with a single purpose: the conversion of plant life into more colonies of leafcutter ants . They are civilizations designed by natural selection to replicate themselves in as many copies as possible before their inevitable death . Because they possess one of the most complex communication systems known in animals, as well as the most elaborate caste systems, air-conditioned nest architecture, and populations into the millions, they deserve recognition as Earth‘s ultimate superorganisms . They are all the more remarkable for consisting entirely of a mother queen and her daughters . Males

are reared only seasonally, are then in a tiny minority, and serve only to inseminate virgin queens during nuptial flights away from the nests . Thenthey die, by design of their bodies and instinctive behavior .

If visitors from another star system had visited Earth a million years ago, before the rise of humanity, they might have concluded that leafcutter colonies were the most advanced societies this planet would ever be able to produce . Yet there was one step to take, the invention of culture, making it possible for humans to become the most dominant species on this planet .

BIOMIMICRY AT ASU Prasad Boradkar, InnovationSpace, Arizona State University, prasad .boradkar@asu .edu .

I will discuss the use of biomimicry as a fundamental strategy for creating sustainable design in InnovationSpace as well as the program‘s efforts to formalize biomimicry in the classroom, on research agendas and in centers across the ASU campus .

ASU has become a leader in the emerging field of biomimicry . Notable examples include: InnovationSpace– a joint venture established by ASU‘s Herberger

Institute for Design and the Arts, W .P . Carey School of Business and Ira A . Fulton School of Engineering–is pioneering biomimicry in its core curriculum as a fundamental strategy for creating sustainable product concepts .

Center for Bio-Inspired Solar Fuel Production – funded with a $14 million Department of Energy grant – focuses on unlocking the secrets of energy conversion in photosynthetic organisms and will use these natural processes as a model for creating an artificial system of solar-powered fuel production .

In recognition of its leadership in this area, in 2009 ASU became a signatory of the Biomimicry Affiliate Program of the Montana-based Biomimicry Institute . ASU is the only U .S . institution to be awarded affiliate status and one of only three institutions worldwide .

TASK ORGANIZATION IN INSECT COLONIES: CONNECTIONS TO HUMAN SOCIAL CONSTRUCTS Jennifer Fewell, School of Life Sciences, Arizona State University, j .fewell@asu .edu

Among social taxa, the social insects best parallel humans in the organizational complexity of their social units . But, is there utility

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in applying our understanding of social insect social dynamics to inform us about mechanisms of social organization within human social groups? I will discuss the application of self-organizational models to the emergence of social structure in the social insects, focusing on the questions of how division of labor emerges within insect colonies, and how it may similarly emerge across social contexts in humans . In both systems, division of labor provides specific advantages, while also potentially generating costs that must be dealt with within the group . I will also consider the advanced communication systems used by the highly eusocial insects to organize their division of labor as a lesson for the organization of work in human social units .

BENEFITS AND COSTS OF COLLECTIVE STRATEGIES: GROUP DECISION-MAKING AND DIVISION OF LABORAnna Dornhaus University of

Arizona dornhaus@email .arizona .edu

Social insects display complex collective organization; I would like to discuss what we know about the benefits of such collective strategies compared to simpler, individual ones . For example, groups (colonies) of ants find, rate, and choose between several available new nesting sites if their old nest site is destroyed or inferior . In this process, the information collected by many colony members is taken into account by a voting-like process . However, if time is short (perhaps because the brood, immature ants, at the old nest site are in danger), individual ants make decisions about where to move, and the intricate collective decision-making process is abandoned or at least modified .

To give another example, social insect colonies often display division of labor, in which different

members of the colony specialize on different tasks . What are the benefits to the group of such specialization (which implies individual biases in task choice), compared to, say, each individual choosing what to work on randomly or purely based on need? The answer to this is far from clear . In some cases, it may be that the colony produces cheap, low-quality workers alongside expensive, high-quality workers instead of producing specialists for different tasks .

SOCIAL INSECTS AND COLLECTIVE DECISION-MAKING IN ORGANIC COMPUTING Martin Middendorf University of Leipzig, Germany . middendorf@informatik .uni-leipzig .de

WHEN IS BIOMIMETIC TASK ALLOCATION EFFECTIVE? Craig Tovey1 and Sunil Nakrani2 . 1Georgia Tech, 2Tata Research Design and Development Centre . ctovey@isye .gatech .edu .

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Biomimicry has been applied successfully to several task allocation and scheduling problems, including job shop scheduling, web host server allocation, and bucket brigade worker ordering . On the other hand, biomimicry has suffered some notable failures, including Enron management and the traveling salesman problem . We explore several of these cases with the aim of understanding what makes biomimicry effective or ineffective . Our tentative conclusion is that the biology must match the problem at hand, and that good matching is aided by deeper knowledge of the biology .

SEARCH ENGINES AND HOUSE HUNTING ANTS, Nigel Franks, University of Bristol, United Kingdom, nigel .franks@bristol .ac .uk .

Search engines retrieve information from the World Wide Web by seeking specific content, first, through massively parallel exploration, and second, by ranking discovered sites in terms of previous hits or existing links . Such search engines thus use earlier reactions of individuals to sites to focus further exploration and selection on the best and most influential sites . Ant colonies looking for new nest sites also operate as search engines and constantly interrogate an ever-changing housing market . Many ants search independently and in parallel for potentially better nest sites, which will vary unpredictably in space, in number, and in quality . They take many factors into account when assessing nest sites . Indeed, they seem to use a weighted additive strategy – a

very thorough consumer strategy that takes all important variables into account according to their relative value . This should make the ants immune to distraction effects . Rationality should also be promoted if the ants value nests against their own internal “scales” rather than choosing on the basis of comparisons between nests . Individual ants only commit and recruit quickly to good nest sites after a quorum has been achieved at a suitable site . The quorum threshold, i .e . the number of nestmates found at a site, is generally set at a reasonably high level and this should imply that a sufficient number of ants have independently linked themselves to that site: literally by voting with their feet . The ants can vary the quorum threshold with circumstances and exhibit speed accuracy trade-offs .

SOCIOBIOMIMICRY OF THE HIVE FOR DISTRIBUTED FEEDBACK CONTROL, Kevin Passino, The Ohio State University, passino@ece .osu .edu

A honey bee colony is a superorganism . There is no central supervisor such as the queen . Decisions, communications, and actions of thousands of worker bees dynamically combine in several social decision-making processes that serve the colony as a whole . During “social foraging”, the colony optimally allocates foragers according to the relative profitability of forage sites (e .g ., flower patches) . The colony dynamically adjusts this forager allocation as flowers bloom or die, and as highly profitable forage sites are discovered . After

colony fission produces a swarm that clusters on a branch in the springtime, the swarm performs “nest-site selection” by quickly searching for, and choosing, the best new home it can find . After a small subset (2-5%) of the bees in a swarm search for and agree upon a new nest site, all the bees in a swarm take flight . The airborne swarm is a cloud of 10,000-20,000 bees that appear to be flying in all directions, but with well-defined boundaries approximately 10m (length) by 10m (width) by 3m (high) . Mechanisms of swarm cohesion are not understood . Cohesion does not depend on release of pheromones by worker bees; however, cohesion may depend on complex bee-to-bee interactions and the queen‘s pheromone . At first, the airborne swarm simply hovers at the take-off location, but after about a minute the swarm begins its flight to the chosen nest site, 400m to 4km away . The mechanisms that enable the swarm to accelerate en masse, fly long distances (in cross-winds and around obstacles), and decelerate to arrive at the chosen nest site as an intact group are a deep mystery . At most, only 2-5% of the bees (the scouts) have visited the chosen site, and the queen does not know its location . Somehow, the small minority of scouts manages to effectively guide a large (unruly) group of bees . Our work has shown that the scouts fly fast (“streak”) through the swarm in the direction of the new nest, thereby giving a signal to the followers on how to orient their flight directions (the streaker hypothesis) . We also identify certain mechanisms of swarm “cohesion” (i .e ., how the group

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manages to stick together as a whole) .

Next, using a socio-biomimicry approach, we overview how each of the above cooperative decision-making processes can be modified to solve practical engineering problems in the following areas: (i) multizone temperature control, (ii) surveillance by groups of vehicles, and (iii) distributed control for smart lighting systems .

USING BIOMIMICRY FOR OPTIMAL MATERIAL HANDLING SYSTEMS. Karsten Peters . TU Dresden, Germany . karsten .peters@tu-dresden .de .

Networks of infrastructures are essential to most biological and technical systems realizing

material flows . Remarkably, these systems share the same notions of functional modules, like a transport infrastructure (a cytoskeleton as well as roads, railways or conveyor belts) individual mobile transport units (motor proteins, ants, trucks or transfer cars), buffers for intermediate storage, and other modules, well-known in engineering .

Looking into more detail, it turns out, that these networks are subjected to several physical constraints . Furthermore, all transport networks are challenged by the necessity of covering an area or volume while guaranteeing a certain flow and dealing with the tradeoff between keeping the construction and maintenance costs low while simultaneously

maximizing the reliability and robustness of the network .

We have analyzed structural properties of different material flow networks, among them baggage handling systems in modern airports and other technical material handling systems in comparison to biological networks . Furthermore, we gather insights into the close interdependence of bio-inspired adaptive control strategies as known from social insects with the underlying network topology . Thus we demonstrate that network analysis, optimization and decentralized control based on biological principles has an immediate impact on the design of properties like robustness, stability or the performance of technical systems .

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IMPROVING SERVICE DESIGN USING LIVING SYSTEMS PRINCIPLES. Doug Lawson .Southwest Airlines . doug .lawson@wnco .com .

Mimicry is a particular form of convergent evolution . Evolution can be broken down into some basic factors in the hope of forming the basis for constructing artificially evolving systems .

Evolving systems arise during the transfer of energy through material . Spatial variations in the material involved in the dissipation of energy causes variations in energy flux . If these spatial variations in the material persist, they are called cells . If the material is heterogeneous some components will aggregate between cells and can form selectively permeable barriers . Variations in energy flux cause increases or decreases

in cellular granularity with the concomitant construction or destruction of cellular barriers .

Energy can also be stored in the dissipation structure . If there are catalysts within the structure that can catalyze their own formation, the cells will achieve greater persistence, size, and stored energy . With variations in the energy flux and the presence of self-catalyzing materials that also catalyze the formation of integrating and disintegrating catalysts, varying levels of energy transfer and storage arise .

The cellular separation of various concentrations of special-catalyzing materials causes a spatial variation in the rate of generation of the cells . This can cause an acceleration in the energy flux through the material . Such an acceleration can lead to a higher concentration of the most productive special-catalyzing material or changes in the granularity of the special catalyzing material .

Since variations in the energy

flux causes the conjugation and separation of special-catalyzing material and a change in the numbers of energy transfer levels, materials are repeatedly mixed and held apart . The most common special-catalyzing material will have a level of stability in its structure that matches the flux variations of the system . An artificial, continuously evolving system must exhibit these properties .

In developing new products or services, rather than simply mimicking a living system’s morphology or behavior or attempting to intelligently design an evolved system, it is possible to construct an artificial, continuously evolving system that generates a new product or service . Using this method, the interior of airport terminals can be developed .

LEARNING ROBOT CONTROLLERS BY OBSERVING ANIMALS AND HUMANS. Tucker Balch . Georgia Tech .tucker@cc .gatech .edu .

The BORG Lab at Georgia Tech has participated in a number of research projects directed

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at observing, identifying, and modeling the behavior of animals and humans . Our work has included ants, bees, fish, robots and people . I will provide a report on our efforts to date, describe our present work, and point to results we hope to achieve in the coming years .

COLLECTIVE TRANSPORT BY ANTS AS A MODEL FOR ROBOT TEAMS. Stephen C . Pratt¹, Spring Berman², Vijay Kumar², Quentin Lindsey², and Mahmut Selman Sakar² . ¹School of Life Sciences, Arizona State University, ²University of Pennsylvania . stephen .pratt@asu .edu .

Efficient cooperative transport poses a major challenge for collective robotics . Group retrieval of food by certain ant species offers a promising source of bioinspired solutions . When scouts of the desert ant Aphaenogaster cockerelli find an item too large for a single ant, they quickly organize a small team that lifts and carries it directly to their nest, thus evading more aggressive competitors . This impressive ability is not seen in most ant species, which instead exploit large items in place, cut them into small pieces, or mount much clumsier retrieval efforts . Our goal is to describe in detail the individual actions and communication pathways that make A . cockerelli’s retrieval so efficient . To measure the forces exerted by each ant, we have devised artificial loads ringed with sensors and induced teams of ants to retrieve them . From video records of retrieval we can infer each ant‘s contribution as the team

gathers together, begins to move the load, directs it toward the nest, and guides it around obstacles . This data will show how the ants divide labor among tasks such as propulsion and stabilization of the load, and how each ant‘s role can change in the course of transport . Of particular interest is whether the ants may use the load itself as a means of coordination, via the forces each ant experiences due to the actions of others . A fuller understanding of this behavior will shed light on collective retrieval, and also inspire algorithms for robotic control .

BIO-INSPIRED APPROACHES TO COOPERATIVE MANIPULATION AND TRANSPORT BY ROBOTS. Quentin Lindsey¹, Mike Shomin¹, Spring Berman¹, Vijay Kumar¹, and Stephen Pratt² . ¹University of Pennsylvania, ²Arizona State University . kumar@cis .upenn .edu .

We are interested in controlling robots to perform tasks in which a payload must be manipulated and transported . Instead of designing special purpose robots for each task, our goal is to develop a swarm of identical, small robots that can organize into teams and cooperatively address manipulation tasks that individual robots cannot

accomplish on their own . In this talk, we will briefly describe the design of the robot swarm and the modeling, control and planning of planar manipulation tasks . We have developed controllers for robots based on studies of cooperative transport by ants . We will show through simulation and experimental results that independently controlled robots can grasp and transport objects with no communication or pre-meditated coordination .

PRACTICAL APPLICATIONS OF SELF-ORGANIZATION.Eric Bonabeau . Icosystem . eric@icosystem .com .

In this talk I will describe a few real-world applications of self-organization inspired by biological systems . Examples include decentralized control of a swarm of vehicles, distributed storage, and more .

THE ARCHITECTURE OF SUBTERRANEAN ANT NESTS: WHAT CAN WE MIMIC?

Walter Tschinkel . Dept . of Biological Science, Florida State University . tschinkel@bio .fsu .edu .

Ground-nesting ant species excavate nests that are composed

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of basic elements whose variation and combination give rise to the wide range of species-typical architectures . The great majority of subterranean ant nests are composed of more or less vertical shafts connecting more or less horizontal, flattened chambers (nearly spherical chambers occur among the fungus-gardening ants) . When multiples of these basic units are combined, nests of apparently great complexity arise . All nest architectures evolved through the elaboration of an ancestral architecture, probably a simple shaft and chamber constructed by the primeval ant . As such, modern ant nests arose not through design based on principles, but by gradual modification of what already existed . This evolution implies that particular architectures are adaptive and contribute in specific ways to the colony‘s fitness through affecting colony performance, but how they do this is largely unknown . Speculation includes both social and physical factors: the organization of work groups by the subdivision and design of work space, creation of diverse microclimates, the regulation of crowding, creation of assembly-line-like architecture, promotion of physical stability, facilitation of travel routes and communication, defense against enemies or disease and others . Biomimicry of functional aspects of nest architecture probably needs to await better understanding .

However, there is no such block to the enjoyment and mimicry of the aesthetic features of ant nest architecture .

NEW CONCEPTS IN TERMITE-INSPIRED ARCHITECTURE.Scott Turner . SUNY-ESF . jsturner@syr .edu .

Social insects are renowned for the remarkable structures they build . Architects and designers have long looked to social insects as models for inspiration for innovative or imaginative designs . I will explore

one such model: the mounds built by fungus-growing termites of the genus Macrotermes . These structures have long been thought to be devices for managing the environment of the underground nest, and the principles of their operation are being incorporated into many building designs for wind-driven climate control . New findings show that the actual function of termite mounds is much different and far more complex than has previously been thought, and this opens the window on a

new generation of termite-inspired devices for capturing wind and using it to manage the internal climate of buildings . These findings also point the way to realizing the “living building”, dynamic architecture that self-regulates its function and adapts it to the changing needs of the building‘s inhabitants .

INSPIRED CO-EXISTENCE. Ilaria Mazzoleni . Southern California Institute of Architecture . imazzoleni@hotmail .com .

Learning from animals is a demanding task that has not been

explored to its fullest extent in the fields of design

and architecture . Ecology and biology

are generative and informative disciplines that can influence design projects

in unexpected and interesting ways . A

major challenge facing the field of architecture

today is to go beyond the basic quest of aesthetics and to take a responsible attitude toward the built environment of the future .

My work focuses on the research and application of adaptations from nature to improve design solutions . The resulting architectural concepts are performative and responsive; they take into consideration various dynamic environmental conditions and resources, supporting and enhancing them rather then exploiting them . The Model Community at Salton Sea takes a holistic approach as it considers interrelationships

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between all processes fundamental to sustaining life and preserving nature—in the same manner as ecosystems . Moreover, the project is inspired by the metaphor ecosystems offer: in nature there is no real waste, but rather a reallocation of means, and a recycling, where all is connected, efficient, and self-sustaining .

Insects, in particular, have inspired my conceptual strategies of planning offering models of social, adaptive, integrated, and connected characteristics that often co-exist . In Building High Up, these concepts are extended to the co-existence of species—challenging the traditional notion of urban planning as a field preoccupied with protecting only human life—and offering a more integrated approach . This co- species/co-existence model has been inspired by the study of the “Weaver ants” (Oecophylla smaragdina) and their tree colonies, which have produced an agricultural landscape that co-

exists with the forest rather than replacing it .

The resulting projects in my portfolio are concerned with my interest in the social aspect of living organisms in that they draw upon ideas from social organisms and apply them to humans in an urban setting . I seek to explore relationships between species and establish new connections between humans and nature as well as between humans . In a nutshell, my approach takes inspiration from nature and applies that to the compromised built environment with the goal of reversing,

restoring, and healing the current situation, through holistic and cyclic processes and methods .

ARCHITECTURE, DESIGN AND BIOMIMICRY. Thomas Knittel . HOK Architects . thomas .knittel@hok .com .

Biomimicry provides potential frameworks to understand how nature works as a system and is therefore a productive and insightful tool for re-imagining the built world . The design and execution of high-functioning human dominated ecosystems is an emerging field . Although interest in nature conservation has grown over the past century, the potential for the cultivation of nature tightly knit with human agents mimicking natural processes and energy flows is in its infancy . Challenges include redesigning cities optimized for multi-functionalism rather than maximized for individual concerns . This radical change will be necessary for the design of locally appropriate yet globally aware low carbon man- made ecologies .

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Pilot projects at HOK are exploring the incremental application and challenges of Biomimicry at the building and planning scale . We have created master plans with the Biomimicry Guild and HOK designers through a process known as Biologists at the Design Table . In a large recently completed plan in India, an Ecological Performance Standard established metrics and benchmarks against which the design could be measured in accordance with triple bottom line (social, economic, and environmental) principles, including valuation of eco-system services . Inter-organization knowledge transfer is occurring, including: an urban design framework for a new city of 50,000 residents in Changsha China that has created an opportunity for alignment of biotic and abiotic factors; a Public Health Laboratory where processes, containment and human interactions are highly integrated; and a residential tower in Korea where structural innovation is based upon the efficiencies of the honeycomb .

SCIENCE, CURIOSITY AND ADVENTURE – HOW IT ALL HAPPENED TO A NATURALIST. Ray Mendez . Work As Play . workasplay@vtc .net .

I will comment on the conference, talk about the creative process, problem solving and how it leads to adventures . I will also review how these elements are used by me to create movie, television and add effects, and how the same process helps me to design museums, zoos and create images for magazines and books .

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1 . ANT-INSPIRED COLLECTIVE TRANSPORT STRATEGIES FOR GROUPS OF ROBOTS . Spring Berman¹, Quentin Lindsey¹, Mahmut Selman Sakar¹, Michael Shomin¹, Vijay Kumar¹, Stephen Pratt² . ¹University of Pennsylvania, ²Arizona State University . spring@seas .upenn .edu .

Group food retrieval in some ant species serves as a useful paradigm for multi-robot collective transport strategies that are decentralized, scalable, and do not require a priori information about the payload . We investigate this phenomenon in Aphaenogaster cockerelli in order to extract the ants‘ roles during transport, the

rules that govern their actions, and the individual forces that they apply to guide a food item to their nest . We developed and simulated a behavioral model to replicate individual ant activity as well as certain macroscopic features of the transport . The behavioral model incorporates a quasi-static dynamical model of planar manipulation that we have used to model manipulation tasks with multiple robots that are equipped with compliant end-effectors . This model allows us to predict payload velocities for specified robot motions . Our manipulation experiments with small differential drive robots validate the dynamical model .

2 . INFORMATION FLOW IN ANT SOCIAL NETWORKS . Benjamin Blonder . University of Arizona . bblonder@gmail .com .

Ant colonies are models of how simple individuals can produce complex structures . With their interaction networks ants regulate information flow, and some individuals may specialize in information distribution . I am discovering that Temnothorax workers are not identical and their social networks are more reciprocal and less efficient than human networks . Ant societies may be more complex and organized than we imagine!

3 . BEHAVIORAL AND NUTRITIONAL REGULATION OF COLONY GROWTH IN ACROMYRMEX VERSICOLOR . Rebecca M . Clark and Jennifer H . Fewell . School of Life Sciences, Arizona State University . rebecca .m .clark@asu .edu .

Relatively little is known about the sorts of organizational changes that occur as groups increase in size . My research emphasizes how nutrition and behavior influence the growth of social insect colonies, specifically colonies of the desert leafcutter ant, Acromyrmex versicolor . Leafcutter ants harvest leaves that are used to grow a symbiotic fungus, which serves

PosterABSTRACTS

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as the ants‘ direct food source . The relationship between ants and fungus has evolved over the course of more than 30 million years, which means there has been ample time for natural selection to shape multiple aspects of the relationship . By studying the nutritional feedbacks that have evolved between the ants and fungus, as well as studying factors that influence worker task performance within the nest, we hope to gain insights into the types of feedback systems that operate in naturally occurring complex systems .

4 . HOW TO COMPARE BASEBALL PLAYERS . Jeffrey Doker . Math Dept ., UC Berkeley . doker@math .berkeley .edu .

Fans of baseball often look for ways to measure how similar two players are to each other . Knowing who is most similar to whom can be very useful for

projecting future performance of new players as well as making smart trades . Unfortunately, this process is almost always extremely subjective . A less subjective approach to the similarity problem lets the data points themselves decide how to be most accurately represented and compared by collectively nudging each other in the direction of an optimal solution . This is done using an iterative approximation of the statistical tool of principal component analysis .

5 . REPRODUCTIVE PHYSIOLOGY AND DIVISION OF LABOR IN THE CALIFORNIA HARVESTER ANT, POGONOMYRMEX CALIFORNICUS WORKERS . Adam Dolezal . School of Life Sciences, Arizona State University . adam .dolezal@asu .edu .

In the California harvester ant, Pogonomyrmex californicus, founding queens exhibit a semi-claustral founding cycle, in which the queens must forager for provisions before worker emergence . Additionally, in some populations, queens found nests cooperatively; in these multi-queen associations, a division of labor between nest-biased and field-

biased (foraging) tasks can occur . Previous work on this system has shown that

this behavioral diphenism is associated with elevated juvenile hormone (JH) levels in field- biased

individuals of both individually-founding and cooperatively-founding queens, while ecdysteroid levels show no pattern (Dolezal et al . 2009) . To better understand the role of reproductive physiology in regulating behavioral change, and to better evaluate hypotheses about the physiological mechanisms behind the evolution of complex social behavior in insects, we sought to investigate the role of these hormones in the well-known behavioral transitions of the worker caste .

Here, we titered the reproductively-associated hormones JH and ecdysteroids in P . californicus workers of several behavioral groups . First, newly-emerged workers were marked and introduced to lab colony; these workers were sampled during while performing nest tasks or foraging tasks as they aged naturally . To remove the age factor from the design, we also created single-cohort colonies, in which a colony was created with only workers of the same age; due the this colony dynamic, some workers began precociously foraging, allowing us to sample workers of the same age performing nest and foraging tasks . In both experiments, foraging workers exhibited highly elevated JH levels when compared to their nest-biased counterparts, matching predictions generated based on the

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queen caste . Similarly, ecdysteroid titers were not different between the groups . Our data provides new insights into the physiological regulation of behavior in ants, as well as a better groundwork with which to understand the evolution of eusociality in this group .

6 . THE VALUE OF INDIVIDUAL AND COLLECTIVE INFORMATION IN THE HONEYBEE DANCE LANGUAGE . Matina Donaldson-Matasci and Anna Dornhaus . Department of Ecology and Evolution, University of Arizona . matina@email .arizona .edu .

The honeybee dance language, used to recruit nestmates to flowers, is thought to be adaptive because it allows the colony to collect resources more efficiently . However, it has been shown that the dance language only increases nectar collection in certain habitats, while in others it seems to have no impact . Why? One important factor may be the way flowers are distributed around the hive . For example, if flowers are difficult to find, then communication might be important mainly because it allows many recruits to take advantage of a single scout‘s find; that is, the location information that successful scouts collect is extremely valuable . Alternatively, if flowers are easy to find but highly variable in quality, then communication might be important mainly because it allows the colony to concentrate on the best resources . In this case the main value of the communication system would lie not in the location information that each dancer transmits, but rather in the collective‘s ability to

integrate that information . Here we report the results of a pilot study showing how an individual forager‘s success depends on her “informational state” — whether or not she had previously found food, and whether or not she followed a dance before leaving the hive . By comparing various measures of foraging success across informational states, we define measures of the value of individual-level and collective-level information . Future work will compare these measures to overall measures of colony success across habitats to see which information level contributes most to the value of communication .

7 . TRACKING VARIABLE ENVIRONMENTS: EFFECTS OF REWARD RATIO AND PERSISTENCE ON FORAGING BUMBLEBEES . Aimee S . Dunlap, Daniel R . Papaj, and Anna Dornhaus . University of Arizona . asdunlap@email .arizona .edu .

Foraging animals must contend with a changing environment . Tracking changes in resources requires decisions on when to gain new information, how long to remember that information for, and how to apply that learned information in the future . In this study we test when foraging bumblebees will acquire new information . Theory predicts that the value of acquiring information depends on both the persistence of the environment and the ratio of the rewards to be gained . We applied foraging models of optimal sampling to an experimental scenario giving bumblebees repeated choices between a steadily rewarding option and

an option that varied between a good and a bad reward at a given rate . Bees can choose to acquire information and track changes, or use an alternative such as choice constancy . The ratio of reward and rate of change have a significant effect on how closely bees track the changes: bees

track more closely with a slowly changing environment featuring good potential rewards . Sampling results are more complicated; here persistence affects how frequently bees sample, but only bees potentially gaining the best reward match our theoretical prediction in a qualitative way . We find great individual variability in choice constancy, however as with tracking, both persistence

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and reward affect behavior . These data suggest that tracking is only worthwhile for bumblebees in very persistent environments . So while the economics of the foraging situation do seem to matter to bees, they sample and track generally less than predicted by theory .

8 . QUANTIFYING THE FITNESS VALUE OF INFORMATION: HOW ANTS TURN INFORMATION INTO FOOD . Tatiana Flanagan, Kenneth Letendre, William Burnside, Matthew Fricke, and Melanie Moses . University of New Mexico . tpaz@unm .edu .

Desert seed harvesting ants are central place foragers that search for resources collectively . Two key resources are food and information, including information about where to find food . The rate of seed harvesting can be increased by individual ants returning to sites where they previously found food (site fidelity), or by ants communicating the location of food to other ants (recruitment) . We conducted field studies and computer simulations to test how much site fidelity and recruitment increase the rate of seed intake as a function of colony size and heterogeneity in the distribution of food . In our observations of ants in the field, seeds were collected faster when they were placed in fewer large piles, but colony size had no effect on seed harvesting rates . In simulations parameterized by our field observations, patch fidelity and recruitment both increased seed harvesting rates from food clumped in large piles, but colony size had no effect on seed harvesting rate . The

simulations allow us to quantify how much information, held in the memory of an individual ant or communicated between nest mates, increases seed harvesting rates, an important component of fitness .

9 . INTERACTIONS BETWEEN NUCLEAR- AND MITOCHONDRIAL-ENCODED GENES CONTRIBUTE TO HYBRID BREAKDOWN AND MAY LEAD TO SPECIATION . Joshua D . Gibson, Arizona State University . jdgibson@asu .edu .

Almost all multicellular organisms utilize the oxidative phosphorylation (OXPHOS) pathway in their mitochondria to produce adenosine 5‘-triphosphate (ATP), the principal source of cellular energy . This pathway‘s function critically depends on the tight interaction of genes encoded in both the nuclear and the mitochondrial genomes . The mitochondrial genome accumulates substitutions at a higher rate than the nuclear genome; however, the ability of natural selection to remove these deleterious substitutions from mitochondrial genes is significantly reduced relative to nuclear genes . It has therefore been hypothesized that nuclear encoded genes of the OXPHOS pathway are under strong selective pressure to compensate for the accumulation of deleterious substitutions in mitochondrial encoded OXPHOS genes, a process known as compensatory co-adaptation .

We tested this hypothesis by analyzing nuclear encoded OXPHOS genes for signatures of positive selection (dN/dS ratio) as well as evolutionary constraints

(based on physicochemical properties) at amino acid sites, utilizing the genome sequences of the parasitoid wasp genus Nasonia as well as several other holometabolous insects . For at least four of the 59 studied nuclear encoded OXPHOS genes, we found evidence for positive selection . Three of the four genes further contain amino acid replacements at evolutionarily constrained sites between species . These genes could therefore account for the previously reported disruption of the OXPHOS pathway in interspecific Nasonia hybrids, where they have to interact with mitochondrial encoded genes with which they have not co-evolved . Our results are consistent with the hypothesis of compensatory co-adaptation of the nuclear and mitochondrial genes of the OXPHOS pathway, and may constitute initial evidence for the role of the OXPHOS pathway in speciation .

10 . DIVISION OF LABOR SCALES WITH COLONY SIZE IN THE SEED-HARVESTER ANT POGONOMYRMEX CALIFORNICUS . C . Tate Holbrook and Jennifer H . Fewell . School of Life Sciences, Arizona State University . ctholbrook@asu .edu .

Just as body size has profound consequences for the structure and function of organisms, properties of social groups can be influenced by group size . Social scaling appears to play a critical role in the organization of insect societies, particularly eusocial colonies, which are tightly integrated and vary tremendously in size . We investigated how the organization

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of work scales with colony size in the monomorphic seed-harvester ant Pogonomyrmex californicus . First, we observed that colonies exhibited higher levels of division of labor (i .e ., individuals were more specialized) after 1 year of growth, with 160-337 workers, than when they were 3 months old, containing 10-30 workers . Next, we quantified task performance by 1-year-old colonies that ranged from 30 to 390 workers due to differences in growth rate; again, division of labor increased with colony size, in this case independently of colony age . In neither context was colony size associated with per capita workload, which was normally distributed across workers in most colonies . Analyses of social scaling may yield important insights into the development and evolution of insect societies and other social groups, and will perhaps reveal more general principles of biological design and function .

11 . THE ANT RAFT . David Hu, Nathan Mlot, and Victor Breedveld . Georgia Tech . hu@me .gatech .edu .

To survive floods, fire ants link their legs together to assemble a raft with their own bodies . Because ants are nearly as dense as water, this cooperative behavior requires that a portion of the ant colony must sacrifice itself by remaining underwater to support the colony’s weight . Surprisingly, few ants drown during this process due to a striking metamorphosis of the raft: as we show using time-lapse photography, the raft morphs from a spherical to a pancake shape . This pancake configuration–a monolayer of floating ants supporting their dry counterparts–allows all ants to both breathe and remain united as a colony . Data is presented in the form of the dimensions and the rates of formation of the ant raft . We use the statics of small floating bodies to account for the equilibrium raft size as a function of the initial mass and density of the ants .

12 . FLEXIBILITY OF SPATIAL ORGANIZATION AND ROBUSTNESS OF DIVISION OF LABOR IN BUMBLEBEES UNDER

VARYING WORKER DENSITY . Jennifer Jandt, Tom Shea, Mary Levandowski, and Gil Wasserman . University of Arizona . jandt@email .arizona .edu .

The success of social insects has been attributed to their division of labor; each individual performs different tasks within a colony simultaneously . Different tasks typically take place in different areas throughout the nest, and many species, including the bumble bee Bombus impatiens, exhibit a division of space that correlates with their division of labor . For example, larval feeders tend to remain in the center of the nest, whereas foragers tend to reside on the periphery . However, bumblebees maintain a high level of plasticity in their ability to perform any colony task depending on colony need . Here we examine the robustness of spatial zones and the tasks most often performed within them by removing a subset of workers from 6 colonies of B . impatiens . We show that when we remove bees that are more likely to reside in the central areas of the nest ( ‘Small Zone Removed’), the remaining workers move in towards the center . Yet, when we remove bees that reside on the periphery of the nest ( ‘Large Zone Removed‘), there is no consistent change in area use by workers that differs from random ( ‘Random Removed‘) . Furthermore, regardless of which bees were removed from the nest, there was no change in the degree to which individuals specialized on colony tasks . We conclude that spatial organization in bumble bees is flexible and likely results from worker interactions, whereas division of labor is robust, and is

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not affected by changes in worker population density .

13 . SOME PHYSICAL CHARACTERISTICS OF THE MOUNDS OF THE HARVESTER ANT POGONOMYRMEX COMANCHE (HYMENOPTERA: FORMICIDAE: MYRMICINAE) . Ann Mayo . Department of Biology, University of Texas at Arlington . amayo@uta .edu .

The physical structure of mounds of ants in the genus Pogonomyrmex vary in size and form . Some of these forms demonstrate interesting properties, such as an increase in internal temperature of the upper portion of the nest which may extend the foraging time in cooler parts of the year . An initial investigation of such effects was made of the mounds of Pogonomyrmex comanche . These mounds are usually characterized by a distinct, crater-shape and the removal of most plants from the crater area .

The soil compaction and temperature of the mounds were compared to areas of the immediate habitat and the nearby habitat which lacked nests in two sites in Fort Worth and one site in Arlington, Texas . No significant differences were found in compaction of the nesting areas from surrounding areas which indicates that other soil features may be important in determining where the ants nest within these sites . The temperature data indicated a significant difference between the external mound and internal mound but these differences were also observed at the edge of the mound and 20 cm away . Of the variables measured, the most important for the internal mound temperature was the external mound temperature with % plant cover and size of the crater not having a significant impact on the internal temperature . Thus, it seems that, unlike the pebbled mounds of P . barbatus, P . rugosus, and P . occidentalis, the crater mounds of P . comanche may not serve to moderate temperature .

14 . MECHANISMS OF SOCIAL REGULATION CHANGE WITH COLONY SIZE IN THE ANT CAMPONOTUS FLORIDANUS . Dani Moore and Jürgen Liebig . School of Life Sciences, Arizona State University . dani .moore@asu .edu .

A social insect colony grows from a solitary foundress to a complex society with thousands of members . As it grows, a colony faces different organizational challenges, necessitating different strategies according to the colony‘s age, stage, or size . One of the most important regulatory

tasks in a social insect colony is maintaining worker sterility . In large colonies of the ant Camponotus floridanus, workers use hydrocarbons on eggs to police reproductive workers; eggs lacking the hydrocarbons of a mature queen are destroyed . However, the hydrocarbons on queen-laid eggs change dramatically during colony growth, and eggs laid by incipient queens are indistinguishable from worker-laid eggs . We find workers from incipient colonies do not police eggs and instead tolerate worker-laid eggs, eggs laid by a mature queen, and eggs laid by their own queen . The absence of policing in small colonies shows mechanisms of social regulation change across colony development . What explains the change in worker‘s response to eggs? One potential mechanism is experience . Workers may learn the profile of the most prevalent eggs in their nest and destroy eggs that do not match the familiar profile . We test this hypothesis by providing worker groups with worker eggs, queen eggs, or no eggs and then testing the workers’ response to queen- and worker-laid eggs after several weeks . We find repeated exposure to worker eggs induces worker-egg acceptance . We propose three additional hypotheses that may account for the change in workers‘ response to egg hydrocarbons: colony demography, colony context, and maternal effects .

15 . ALTERNATIVE REPRODUCTIVE STRATEGIES DURING COLONY ESTABLISHMENT IN A PRIMITIVELY EUSOCIAL WASP . Floria Mora-Kepfer . Department of Biology, University of Miami .

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floriamk@bio .miami .edu .

Primitively eusocial wasps are excellent models for testing which factors have an effect on reproductive plasticity . The roles of primary reproductives and auxiliary workers are determined during adulthood and consequently, reproductive competition is widespread during colony establishment . Colonies can be established by alternative strategies: initiate nest construction as a group of foundresses who are often related or initiate construction as a solitary foundress . Besides solitary nest founding, a foundress has two alternative reproductive options: to join conspecifics on another nest or to attempt usurpation of a foreign nest . In a field colony of the paper wasp Mischocyttarus mexicanus, I tested if reproductive plasticity is linked to reproductive strategy during colony establishment . I compared ovary development, body size and behavioral interactions in nests initiated by both strategies . In this population I rarely observed solitary nesting without joiners and did not observe any usurpation events . I detected two main reproductive strategies: a foundress initiated a nest and was joined by other females or multiple females initiated nest construction together . My findings suggest that small females join nests established by a single foundress instead of initiating a nest and these joiners exhibit underdeveloped ovaries . In contrast, females that nest together exhibit similar body size . In an experiment where foreign wasps were manipulated to

simulate joining behavior, colony residents in both reproductive strategies exhibited aggression towards potential joiners in 50% of the introductions . My data implicate body size and ovary development as central factors that influence reproductive competition and alternative strategies during colony establishment .

16 . FROM CONFLICT TO COOPERATION: COLONY FOUNDING BY UNRELATED ANT QUEENS . Rick Overson, Jennifer H . Fewell, Stephen C . Pratt, Rebbeca M . Clark, and Jürgen Gadau . School of Life Sciences, Arizona State University . rick .overson@asu .edu .

Although much research has explored the costs and benefits of cooperation, comparatively little work has addressed the behavioral changes which accompany the switch from a solitary to a cooperative life history . The California harvester ant Pogonomyrmex californicus is ideal for studying the behavioral mechanisms involved in this transition because it has populations of haplometrotic queens (those which found colonies alone) living in close proximity to a localized population of pleometrotic queens (those which found colonies in groups) . We investigated the behavioral differences between queens from haplometrotic and pleometrotic populations in the laboratory . Individuals who

cooperate in societies must first both locate and tolerate one another . As expected, queens from the pleometrotic population readily formed clusters around a common brood pile . Surprisingly, clustering was equally common among queens from haplometrotic populations . Haplometrotic queens, however, were much less likely than pleometrotic queens to tolerate one another during initial colony development . Hence most foundress associations composed of queens from haplometrotic populations developed into monogynous colonies, i .e . only one queen survived the aggressive interactions within the group . Incidents of aggression and aggression-linked mortality were significantly more frequent in associations of haplometrotic queens than in pleometrotic associations . We argue that the evolution of tolerance towards cofoundresses is a necessary and potentially sufficient mechanism for the transition from solitary to cooperative colony founding in P . californicus .

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17 . DESIGN AND ANALYSIS OF COOPERATIVE TASK-PROCESSING AGENTS . Theodore P . Pavlic and Kevin M . Passino . The Ohio State University . pavlic .3@osu .edu .

This work describes the dynamical behavior of spatially constrained agents that can each share the task-processing burden of their immediate neighbors . The work is influenced by studies of the evolution of cooperation and extends existing work in the design of resource allocation strategies on cooperative agents . A framework for shared task processing on a network is presented, and theoretical results show sufficient conditions on distributed and asynchronous agent behaviors that guarantee an optimal allocation of task-processing resources on the network . These sufficient conditions include a network version of Hamilton’s rule . In particular, in order to guarantee convergence of the gradient ascent algorithm on each agent, the benefit-to-cost ratio of cooperation must be greater than a measure of the topological relatedness between agents . The framework is shown to be applicable for autonomous air vehicles (AAV), mobile software agents, and smart power grids, and simulation results are given for an AAV case .

However, it may also aid in the modeling and analysis of biological (e .g ., cooperative breeding) and social systems where cooperation is not perceived to be mutually beneficial and cannot be enforced by fiat .

18 . DEVELOPMENT OF A SOCIAL HIERARCHY: THE ROLE OF NEUROHORMONES IN DOMINANCE INTERACTIONS OF THE ANT HARPEGNATHOS SALTATOR . Clint Penick¹, Colin Brent², and Juergen Liebig¹ . ¹School of Life Sciences, Arizona State University, ²USDA- ARS, Arid-Land Agricultural Research Center . Clint .Penick@asu .edu .

The formation of a dominance hierarchy results from the outcome of physical contests coupled with internal changes in hormones and physiology . Neurohormones, such as serotonin and dopamine, have been shown to underlie dominance interactions in a range of species from mammals to insects . In the ant Harpegnathos saltator, workers engage in tournaments over reproductive rights that involve aggressive biting as well as a ritualized form of antennal dueling . We first investigated differences in neurohormone levels among castes during stable conditions, and then we followed how these

levels changed in response to behaviors that occur during the period of intense fighting while a new hierarchy is formed . These results help elucidate how behavioral interactions shape social organization and create a division of labor .

19 . GROUP FORAGING IN “BLACK REAPER” ANTS (MESSOR PERGANDEI) . Nicola Plowes . Arizona State University . nicola .plowes@asu .edu .

“Black Reaper” ants are common grain collecting ants in the Sonoran desert . Their foraging behavior is characterized by the formation of long foraging columns which take different compass directions each day- rotating like the hands of a clock . I will present data from a pilot study exploring the relationship between column rotation and intraspecific competition .

20 . CHOOSING WHERE AND WHAT TO DEFEND: SOLDIER DEPLOYMENT IN A RESOURCE LIMITED WORLD . Scott Powell and Anna Dornhaus . University of Arizona . powells@email .arizona .edu .

Physical specialization is a recurrent trend in the evolution of group organization, both within and

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among different levels of biological complexity . Physical specialists can have increased performance for certain tasks, but at the cost of the flexibility to perform others . To maximize these benefit-cost tradeoffs, selection should therefore favor flexible deployment of the standing population of specialists in response to environmental changes . Ants have proved to be model organisms for studying the organization of complex natural systems . Yet, little is understood about the temporal and spatial dynamics of specialist deployment in ants . We present initial findings from an ongoing study addressing how flexible soldier deployment in the turtle ant Cephalotes rohweri affects colony fitness . C . rohweri colonies nest in multiple preexisting arboreal cavities, which are a limited resource used by other arboreal arthropods . A specialized soldier caste defends each nest entrance, but deployment among nests is typically variable . Lab experiments have demonstrated that both the expansion into newly available cavities and an adjustment to soldier deployment is rapid, usually stabilizing in less than two days . Colonies also prefer larger

cavities that will support greater growth . Nevertheless, soldiers are not deployed evenly across all nests . Colonies favor stronger defense of existing nests over new ones, and few or no soldiers are deployed to new nests that have yet to receive brood . This first set of experiments demonstrates that specialist deployment is flexible in time and space, with rapid and discriminatory responses to the availability of resources in the environment .

21 . EVOLUTION AND DIVERSIFICATION OF THE SPECIOSE NEOTROPICAL ANT GENUS CEPHALOTES . Shauna Price¹, Lucy Tran², and Robert Wayne¹ . ¹UCLA, ²University of Michigan . slprice@ucla .edu .

Cephalotes is a diverse genus of ants distributed throughout the Neotropics . Known as the turtle or gliding ants, the 131 fossil and extant members of this group comprise the third largest ant genus in the Neotropical region and the 16th largest worldwide . Fossils date the origin of Cephalotes to at least 25-30 million years ago, an origin younger than that of other ant genera . The species richness and diversity of this genus coupled

with its relatively young origin suggest that it has experienced recent rapid speciation . Only one morphological phylogeny describes the evolution of Cephalotes, despite its species richness, commonness, and widespread distribution . To date, no one has examined the evolution of this genus using molecular techniques . In this study we reconstructed a molecular phylogeny of 37 Cephalotes species to further shed light on these ants’ evolutionary history . Two main conclusions can be extracted from our molecular phylogeny: 1) in general, species group together in the same clades, but 2) relationships between clades differ . Our molecular data thus support the evolutionary relationships within clades, composed of morphologically similar species, but not the evolutionary history of the morphological phylogeny . The results from our dating analyses show that Cephalotes originated around 60 million years ago, in the Paleocene – much earlier than previously thought .

22 . CAN A SOCIAL INSECT HELP BUILD INSIGHTS INTO THE CONNECTION BETWEEN AGING AND MEMORY LOSS? Brenda Rascón¹ and Gro V . Amdam¹ ² . ¹Department of Chemistry, Biotechnology and Food Science, Norwegian University of Life Sciences, ²Social Insect Research Group, School of Life Sciences, Arizona State University . brenda .rascon@asu .edu .

Oxygen provides the substrate for ATP production necessary for the maintenance of metabolic demands . However, it also plays

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a pivotal role in the process of senescence by serving as a source of reactive oxygen species (ROS), which are known to shorten lifespan and increase cellular patterns of dysfunction characteristic of aged organisms . Invertebrate studies have shown that hyperoxia strongly reduces lifespan . However, the mechanisms by which cell metabolism affects complex traits such as learning ability during normal aging, are largely unknown . While lifespan extension is possible in model organisms, functional impairment such as memory loss often accompanies enhanced longevity . Our study aims to increase understanding of how neuronal metabolic biology affects learning and memory in aged animals . To achieve insight, we combine previous knowledge of the Drosophila model system and apply it to Apis mellifera, a eusocial organism with a neuroscience pedigree . In so doing, we examined longevity and associative learning performance in Apis under oxygen stress and applied a therapeutic agent to test whether observed patterns of ROS-induced frailty such as high mortality and learning impairment can be attenuated .

23 . (IR)RATIONAL DECISIONS IN ANTS . Takao Sasaki . Arizona State University . tsasaki1@asu .edu .

Classic economic theory assumes that decision makers are rational, meaning that they choose among options according to stable preference functions . Moreover, evolutionary theory predicts that animals make choices that maximize their fitness, and therefore should be rational

decision makers . Rationality implies that decision makers evaluate options independently, rather than by comparing available options to one another . Humans and many animals often show irrational preferences when faced with difficult choices among options that vary in multiple attributes . However, the existence of similar departures from rationality has barely been tested in collective decision-makers, such as social insect colonies . In this study we used ants (Temnothorax rugatulus) to investigate if colonies and individuals would choose nest sites rationally . We hypothesized: (1) isolated individual ants would evaluate nests comparatively (irrationally), but (2) their colonies would evaluate them independently

(rationally) . We used a standard paradigm called the Decoy Effect, which tests whether the preference between two options can be changed by adding a third decoy option . Our results supported our hypotheses . This study demonstrated that individual ants compare nest sites directly, whereas colonies do not . Thus, rational decisions can emerge from irrational decision makers .

24 . DISTRIBUTED AGREEMENT: SWARM GUIDANCE TO COOPERATIVE LIGHTING . Kevin M . Schultz¹, Kevin M . Passino¹, and Thomas D . Seeley² . ¹Department of Electrical & Computer Engineering, The Ohio State University, ²Department of Neurobiology and Behavior, Cornell University . kevin .michael .schultz@gmail .com .

At its core, honeybee (Apis mellifera) swarming is a distributed agreement problem wherein some 2-5% of the thousands of bees are informed “leaders” and are responsible for guidance (i .e ., agreement in flight direction) of the remainder of the uninformed “follower” bees to the new nest site . A novel image processing technique is used here to

automatically track bees in videos of honeybee swarms migrating to new nest sites . Bee motion analysis leads to the discovery of the leader and follower behaviors underlying swarm guidance and cohesion . Leader bees signal the flight direction by flying fast through the top of the swarm . Followers chase leaders and in turn are chased by other followers . This results in a feedback

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process that increases directional coherence as the swarm moves . Swarm cohesion is maintained during guidance since bees near the edges speed up to reorient themselves back to the middle of the swarm . Since honeybee swarm flight is fundamentally a distributed agreement process, the coordinated motion of honeybees and other species can be modeled and applied to other distributed agreement problems . One such problem is the control of networked zones of light-sensor pairs, so-called “cooperative lighting .” Cooperative lighting can be used to lessen our current energy consumption and take advantage of sunlight in real-world installations . Here, a physical micro-test bed for lighting control experiments is introduced, and an analysis of a number of control routines presented, with a focus on distributed agreement algorithms .

25 . THE FOUNDRESS‘ DILEMMA: AN AGENT-BASED MODEL OF COLONY-FOUNDING STRATEGY IN ANTS . Zack Shaffer, Marco Janssen, Takao Sasaki, Jennifer Fewell, Marty Anderies, and Stephen Pratt . Arizona State University . zshaffe@asu .edu .

While much of cooperation in social insects is explainable through indirect fitness (relatives helping relatives), unrelated ant foundresses can form seemingly altruistic cooperatives to found colonies . Cooperative colony foundation helps foundresses survive the challenges of environmental stress and intraspecific predation, albeit at a cost: nest reproductive output must be shared among foundresses .

The presence of cooperative and uncooperative foundresses in some populations of ants provides an interesting biological story with interesting parallels to Maynard Smith‘s ‘haystack’ model of group selection . As such, the ant foundress case may have a larger significance: it may illustrate group selection within a natural context .

Agent-based modeling provides a useful tool to explore the evolution of this form of cooperation . Simulation helps account for spatial and stochastic qualities in the natural world . Our model: cooperative and uncooperative foundress agents compete in a variety of environments (harsh or benign) for survival . Cooperative agents gain an advantage in terms of survival but lose reproductive ‘market share‘ . The cooperative advantage in survival is most pronounced in the harsh environment . Uncooperative agents have less chance of survival but monopolize reproduction in their nest . Using empirical data from the ant Pogonomyrmex californicus, we have made an abstract model to gain insight into the ant foundress question: When does it pay to cooperate?

26 . CARBOHYDRATE FORAGING, SUCROSE SENSITIVITY AND THE OVARY IN THE HONEY BEE . Adam J . Siegel and Robert E . Page Jr . School of Life Sciences, Arizona State University . asiegel1@asu .edu .

The foraging bias of honey bees towards carbohydrates or proteins is a classic example of task specialization in social insects . The reproductive ground-plan hypothesis (RGPH) of Amdam et al .

(2004, 2006) proposes that these foraging biases are regulated by variation in the size of the ovary in the worker honey bee . Honey bees with larger ovaries tend to have a protein bias compared to workers with smaller ovaries . Links have been demonstrated

between the ovary and sucrose sensitivity, the ovary and foraging bias, and sucrose sensitivity and foraging bias . We used a flow-rate controlled artificial sucrose delivery system and a proboscis extension response assay to investigate the relationship between the ovary, sucrose sensitivity and carbohydrate collection under highly controlled conditions and in the absence of pollen (protein source) . We found a strong relationship between sucrose concentration and collected sucrose solution load, as well as an interaction effect between ovary size and sucrose sensitivity on collected sucrose solution volume . This suggests that the ovary is having an impact on carbohydrate collection through a modulation of sucrose sensitivity, which in turn impacts protein collection .

27 . UTILIZING AND TEACHING BIOMIMICRY IN NEW PRODUCT DEVELOPMENT . Adrian Smith¹

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and Heidi Fischer² . ¹School of Life Sciences, ²Herberger Institute for Design and the Arts, Arizona State University . Adrian .Smith@asu .edu .

Biomimicry is a design methodology that utilizes natural systems as a source of inspiration and innovative ideas . But, how does this approach fit with what designers, engineers, and business students are educated to do? How can biomimicry be taught in undergraduate programs alongside these disciplinary programs? We present a model of how biomimicry is taught within a new-product development program, InnovationSpace, at ASU .

Our approach, which utilizes material developed by the Biomimicry Institute, views natural systems as a source of innovative ideas and a guide to sustainable design . Our students (business, industrial design, visual communication, and engineering) learn how to apply biological ideas in a year-long product-development design studio . Biomimicry is taught alongside disciplinary curricula, and within an overall framework of integrated innovation . We will present that innovation frame work, the Life‘s Principles approach to sustainability, and our approach to finding biologically inspired solutions for design challenges .

28 . WHAT ROLE DO HYDROCARBONS HAVE IN LARVAE ACCEPTANCE IN THE GENUS CAMPONOTUS? . Auriel-Robert Vilaire and Juergen Liebig . School of Life Sciences, Arizona State University . aavilaire@cox .net .

Animals care for their offspring, but this imposes a cost on the

caretaker . To minimize the costs, animals use various mechanisms to recognize their offspring . Carpenter ants of the genus Camponotus recognize their brood by cuticular hydrocarbons on the larvae‘s surface . Since different Camponotus share many cuticular hydrocarbons, workers may not discriminate between them . If they are not able to discriminate, it may be possible to exchange larvae between colonies . The prediction is that the colony will accept larvae with the closest hydrocarbon profile to their own to avoid caring for unrelated offspring .

Two sets of four larvae from different colonies were placed in C . festinatus, C . fragilis, C . tortuganus, and C . floridanus colonies . The larvae were placed on opposite sides of the glass plate, while a timer was set for twenty minutes . During that time, the workers either accepted larvae into the colony or ignored them by placing them in the trash . Using a distance matrix, we measured the similarity between different Camponotus colony larval profiles

and correlated it with the average larvae acceptance rates . When the distance is close to zero, the larvae share more cuticular hydrocarbons with the recipient colony . The average acceptance did not correlate with the distance, since a high average acceptance had a high distance . Instead larvae with less similarity were accepted into the colony, while larvae similar to the colony‘s brood were rejected . This may suggest that the Camponotus accepted larvae by another mechanism .

29 . EMERGENT DESIGN . Sebastian Von Mammen and Christian Jacob . University of Calgary . s .vonmammen@ucalgary .ca .

We consider design an act of intellectual craftsmanship which follows a holistic approach to conquer our arising challenges in engineering or architecture, or to simply enrich our lives culturally . As such, artists, designers, architects, engineers, and computer scientists drive the development and exploration of novel design tools and

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methodologies . Creative options offered through new tools become the catalysts that define new thinking and invention . In tandem, new tools result in new knowledge . The capacity of the computer to help with the conceptualization and organization of design space redefines the meaning of the tool from submissive server to an affirmative and creative partner . Together the designer and computer dream and play in an attempt to find the mindset for design that will subsequently lead to pragmatic solutions . Through steady technological advancements, computer-aided design has surpassed the idea of a three-dimensional drawing board . Instead, when provided with basic procedural and structural building blocks, an algorithmic system can generate solutions to predefined problems by itself . This approach allows the designer to focus on the identification and formulation of contextual interdependencies that drive the design process . Through the integration of computational developmental models with ideas gained from studies of natural complex systems, novel design tools are now ready to be as expressive and powerful as they are applicable to real-world design tasks .

30 . SCALING OF METABOLIC RATE AND NETWORK STRUCTURE IN COLONIES OF THE SEED HARVESTER ANT, POGONOMYRMEX CALIFORNICUS . James S . Waters, Jennifer H . Fewell, and Jon F . Harrison . School of Life Sciences at Arizona State University . james .waters@asu .edu .

The hypometric scaling of metabolic rate with body size is among the most outstanding patterns in biology . We tested whether this pattern extends to physically independent eusocial systems by measuring the standard metabolic rates of whole functioning colonies of the seed-harvester ant Pogonomyrmex californicus . Similar to the pattern observed for individual organisms, colony metabolic rate scaled with mass0 .75 . Hypometric scaling in P . californicus could not be explained by scaling of individual

ant size across colonies or by the effect of density on metabolic rate . Furthermore, isolated worker groups exhibited isometric metabolic rate scaling, suggesting that the social environment of the colony is critical to regulating individual patterns of work output . Individual worker velocities within colonies exhibited power law distributions that scaled with

colony size so that larger colonies exhibited a greater disparity between active an inactive ants than smaller colonies . Video recordings of worker-worker interactions within colony nests were analyzed to characterize the scaling of both global and local network structure .

31 . INDIVIDUAL AND COLLECTIVE BEHAVIOR OF KRILL . Jeannette Yen and David Murphy . Georgia Institute of Technology . jeannette .yen@biology .gatech .edu .

The Antarctic species of krill Euphausia superba are aquatic microcrustaceans (6 cm in length) that demonstrate some of the most spectacular schooling behaviors of invertebrates . Krill can form large oceanic aggregations of up to 30,000 individuals/m3, extending horizontally for several kilometers and >100 m vertically . Krill are dominant members of the acoustically-discovered Deep Scattering Layers . Euphausiids are social animals and spend the majority of their lives in group formation . These aggregations are maintained by individual behaviors and can consist of uncoordinated “swarms” and polarized, highly structured and motile “schools”, often of individuals of the same species and developmental stage . Gregariousness provides benefits by concentrating reproductively mature individuals and possibly increasing foraging time; however, the main advantage to aggregating has generally been attributed to an increased level of protection and vigilance through group avoidance and evasion strategies . Our talk will discuss the individual and collective behavior of krill

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with a consideration of energetic benefits . Determining the presence of structure within schools of krill would help to define the adaptive advantage of this behavior . The behavior that euphausiids exhibit, both individually and in aggregations, is intimately linked to the biomechanics of locomotion . Here, we provide quantitative analyses of these metrics for E . superba, identifying distinct behavioral swimming modes based on differences in these parameters (along with other kinematic parameters such as speed and body angle) . The variability of these parameters over time provides insight into the high sensitivity and responsiveness of krill to their hydrodynamic environment .

32 . CULMINATING PAPER . Katrina Zavalney . Sonoma State University . katrinazavalney@gmail .com .

I am conducting research as part of a culminating paper requirement for my Masters in Psychology with a focus in Organization Development from Sonoma State University . I am interested in attending the conference to explore how human social and organizational systems can mimic bioremedial living systems to improve their effectiveness . My working theory is that consultants can use specific ecological metaphors to support the collective understanding of the larger ecosystems via the identification of toxic human dynamics . The metaphors depict the organization as a living system itself and create a context where the organization continuously learns and improves .

I intend to mimic and create conditions where people can begin to expand their own sense of relatedness to larger circles around them and become more aware of the consequences of actions on the environment, other people, etc . Focusing on human interactions, recognizing the effect we have on each other, system wide, exploring natural systems and biology to a greater depth . The overall goal of my research is to support people‘s thinking about the whole system and effectiveness of feedback loops . The outcome of this approach will hopefully begin assimilating bioremedial process terms into business nomenclature furthering the integration of natural systems into organization development .

I will create and present a diagram of my working theory at the conference and documenting responses as part of my student research using a grounded theory approach .