Antenna Cleaning Is Essential for Precise Behavioral Response to Alarm Pheromone and Nestmate-Non-Nestmate Discrimination in Japanese Carpenter Ants (Camponotus japonicus).

ABSTRACT: Self-grooming of the antennae is frequently observed in ants. This antennal maintenance behavior is presumed to be essential for effective chemical communication but, to our knowledge, this has not yet been well studied. When we removed the antenna-cleaning apparatuses of the Japanese carpenter ant (C. japonicus) to limit the self-grooming of the antennae, the worker ants demonstrated the self-grooming gesture as usual, but the antennal surface could not be sufficiently cleaned. By using scanning electron microscopy with NanoSuit, we observed the ants' antennae for up to 48 h and found that the antennal surfaces gradually became covered with self-secreted surface material. Concurrently, the self-grooming-limited workers gradually lost their behavioral responsiveness to undecane-the alarm p

SUBMITTER: Mizutani H 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC8471180 | biostudies-literature | 2021 Aug

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature