The influence of contact rates on the efficiency (the ability to exploit a profitable environment) and flexibilty (the ability to track a changing environment) of foraging in ants is studied theoretically in the case where foraging relies on a mixture of group and mass recruitment. It is shown...

The clustering of dead bodies by ants is simulated, using a cellular automaton model, the rules of which are carefully derived from experiments. Starting from a random spatial distribution of corpses, a cemetery organizes itself into clusters of corpses. The dynamics of clustering can be...

In several species of ants, workers cooperate to retrieve large prey. Usually, one ant finds a prey item, tries to move it, and, when unsucessful for some time, recuits nestmates through direct contact or chemical marking. When a group of ants tries to move large prey, the ants change position...