“Ants reduce per-worker investment in one of the most nutritionally expensive tissues for the good of the collective,” Matte explains. “They’re shifting from self-investment toward a distributed workforce.”
Power of the collective
The researchers think the pattern they observed in ants reflects a more universal trend in the evolution of societal complexity. The transition from solitary life to complex societies echoes the transition from single-celled organisms to multicellular ones.
In a single-celled organism, a cell must be a “jack-of-all-trades,” performing every function necessary for survival. In a multicellular animal, however, individual cells often become simpler and more specialized, relying on the collective for protection and resources.
“It’s a pattern that
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