myrmepropagandistMar 14

I have a new queen. Lasius brevicornis. The queen is about 9mm Her nanitics are so tiny I'm going to cry. They are 1.5mm and transparent yellow.

They are smaller than the antennae on my Camponotus pennsylvanicus queen. Nanitics are the first workers in a colony and they are often smaller than the workers produced later when the colony is better established. But this is out of control. They are just so small.

They would make a fruit fly look like an elephant.

Show threadmyrmepropagandistMar 14

They still have six legs, tiny mandibles and tiny ant intentions and projects they are working on with their mother.

What do they have in their legs? One muscle fiber per joint?

They are so complex and tiny it's breaking my brain a little.

I don't understand why people aren't freaked about about this more often.

Show threadEric BrombaughMar 14
@futurebird Insect brains seem like a very obvious place to start when studying intelligence - the fact that a few hundred thousand neurons can manifest such a widely varied responsiveness to their environment could tell us a lot about how to build machines that work effectively.
Show threadAlexandre Oliva
and to appreciate how truly amazing this is, we gotta keep in mind that the whole program (the DNA) is present in every single one of these neurons

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Mar 15 at 6:15amWeb