Science news articles about 'leafcutter ants'

Leafcutter ant queens can live for twenty years, fertilizing millions of eggs with sperm stored ... favors the survival of its own sperm over the other males' sperm. However, once sperm has been stored, leafcutter ant queens neutralize male-male ...

A video snapshot of hard-working leafcutter ants in a Costa Rican reserve.

... -Madison researchers has published the complete genome of the leafcutter ant, Atta cephalotes. The study, published ... over the course of evolutionary history. The genome, the first for a leafcutter ant, reveals that the insect has shed genes ...

Leafcutter ants, signature denizens of New World tropical forests, are unique in their ability to harvest fresh leaves to cultivate a nutrient-rich fungus as food.

... , Atta texana, is one of only three leafcutter ant species found in the United States. The species arrived in the region ... is helping the other," says Mueller. "But we have found that this can be the opposite. In the tropics, the symbiosis between the leafcutter ants and their fungal crops helped to broaden ...

... tangible details about the fascinating symbiotic relationship between leafcutter ants, fungi and bacteria," said Kristin Burnum ... nor bacteria work in isolation when it comes to leafcutter ant gardens," Burnum said. "It's possible that the same ...

... for the origin of insect biodiversity in South America, using the leafcutter ants as a model system," says study co ... ago) affected where many Amazonian species, such as leafcutter ants, were able to survive. What was initially ...

... of Science. The ground work for this study began in 1999 when Currie published a paper demonstrating how leafcutter ants mediate their fungal environment through ...

A microbiologist tries to learn bioenergy efficiency from leafcutter ants that farm fungus.

A stunning silhouette of active leafcutter ants in Costa Rica wins the Wildlife Photographer of the Year award.

... species in this quartet, the harvester ant, P. barbatus, and leafcutter ant A. cephalotes, were sequenced largely ... (parasitic) fungi. "The intricate and obligate relationships between the ants and their symbionts are reflected in gene losses in the leaf ...