Social Insect Research Group & Friends

Interview of ASU School of Life Sciences behavioral biologist Stephen Pratt in Knowable Magazine

The mind of an anthill Can we use the tools of psychology to understand how colonies of social insects make decisions?

SIRG finds its way to PBS.

Catalyst: Vaccinations aren't just for humans | Arizona PBS Researchers are racing to make vaccines that will protect bees.

With the Houston flooding, you have probably started seeing articles about the massive rafts of red imported fire ants (RIFA; Solenopsis invicta). However, few of these articles point out that workers of these ants actually inject *more venom than normal* when the ants are in these rafts, which is something SIRGer Kevin Haight discovered. So that's another reason to avoid contact with these rafts if you can.

Kevin's article on this phenomenon: http://doi.org/10.1007/s00040-005-0832-y

Fire ants survive Houston flooding by creating terrifying rafts made of their bodies Nothing to see here...

Just down the street!

Ants Of The Southwest The American Southwest is a hotspot for North American ant diversity, with over 350 species of ants known from Arizona, and a variety of ecologically interesting taxa – including leafcutters, harvester ants, army ants,