Current Biology
Volume 23, Issue 23, 2 December 2013, Pages 2393-2399
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Phase-Dependent Visual Control of the Zigzag Paths of Navigating Wood Ants

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cub.2013.10.014Get rights and content
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Highlights

  • Wood ants maintain direction of their zigzag path through intermittent visual control

  • Ants on course face their visually defined goal just after each turn of the zigzag

  • Ants adjust overall travel direction by making saccadic body turns to face the goal

  • Saccades do not disturb zigzags, as they occur mostly just after a zigzag turn

Summary

Animals sometimes take sinuous paths to a goal. Insects, tracking an odor trail on the ground [1, 2, 3] or moving up an odor plume in the air [4, 5], generally follow zigzag paths. Some insects [6, 7, 8] take a zigzag approach to visual targets, perhaps to obtain parallax information. How does an animal keep its overall path in the direction of the goal without disrupting a zigzag pattern? We describe here the wood ant's strategy when guided by a familiar visual scene. If their travel direction is correct, ants face the goal briefly after each turning point along their zigzag path. If the direction is wrong, they turn rapidly at this point to place the scene correctly on their retina. Such saccade-like turns are rare elsewhere in the zigzag. Similarly, when the scene is made to jump to a new position on their retina, ants wait until an expected goal-facing phase of the zigzag before turning to correct the imposed error. Correctly timed, intermittent control allows an animal to adjust its path without compromising additional roles for the zigzag pattern in gathering visual information or in using odor cues for guidance.

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