Three sheets to the wind

Formicidae, otherwise known as ants, have always fascinated me: Their colonial behaviour, their weightlifting ability, and their absolutism of the regent. However, a recent article A Stilted Story takes the cake. Formicidologists(?) have long wondered how ants are able to migrate over relatively large distances, and then return to the colony. Well...wonder no more: Matthias Wittlinger of Ulm University, Germany has figured it out...using the tried, tested and true scientific approach of using stilts.

Be-stilting? Ants apparently have evolved to have a internal mechanism enables them to count steps. But how do you test this hypothesis?

Impressively, Dr. Wittlinger constructed a 10m tunnel, along which the ants strode to a feeding station, and correctly returned to the colony. One day, after the ants arrived at the feeding station, he then: 1) amputated (antputated?) 1/3 of the ants; and 2) constructed stilted ant legs for another 1/3, and 3) left the remaining control group alone. Those of group 1) made it only halfway home, whereas those in 2) overshot by a factor of two. The control group? Yes...made it home exactly.

That is what I call a convincing experiment, and I can only look on in jealousy of a good result :) However, I can only guess how much fun it was for his graduate students to spend weeks constructing an army's worth of ant stilts....

Cambridge, for those who have never set foot in the jewel of East Anglia, is almost synonymous with its namesake University. However, one quickly realises that the town contains much more: Among others an important religious center and an ale-drinkers paradise. Most everything, though, does relate back to the University even religion and public houses. Indeed, walking through the streets and alleys, one is struck by the magesty of the buildings, and senses the ghosts of venerable members such as Newton, Bacon, Darwin and Keynes.

However, coming from a more humble, egalitarian, colonial country, it is hard to shake off feelings of wealth, priviledge and classism. Some of my favorites include students not permited to talk to tutors in the formal dining hall, and non-college staff not permitted to walk on the grass in the quadrangle. These divisions surround you. Escaping them is difficult.


Fortunately, everyone is equal in the pubs, and anyone can be royalty...