Tunjuru aikoo= jumping ants! Really happy we could present our research in Uchinaaguchi and highlight a fascinating but endangered language here on the island. Great collaboration between scientists, our wonderful Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology (OIST) staff, and some patient Okinawan elders. Integrative Organismal Biology

Now published in a food processing special issue at Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, Evan Economo and my review of ant feeding structure and function. Open access! royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/rs…

An ant brain detector. Happy to see our work on automated insect anatomical segmentation from tomographic scans out on the cover of Natural Sciences. Great collaboration led by Evropi Toukeridou, with Kenji Doya, Carlos Gutierrez, and Daniel Baum. onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/nt…

What is happening to insects? Massive effort by Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology (OIST) researchers + citizens to monitor insect communities across Okinawa island as part of OKEON 美ら森プロジェクト project. This paper led by @ndimhypervol on the habitat-dependence of seasonality of ant communities is just the start.

New fossil ants, insight into ant faunal turnover, and the persistence of the "platonic ant body plan"! Our paper on the youngest-yet stem ants from the Cretaceous, preserved in ~77 Ma North Carolina amber, is now out in Current Biology doi.org/10.1016/j.cub.…

At a recent conference Athena Aktipis invited me to give a talk on the role of creativity in science. For those interested here are the illustrated slides in tweetorial format. The take home message: Creativity and science go hand in hand. (Thread 1 of 2)

Evolution of odorant receptor repertoires across Hymenoptera – including bees, wasps and ants - is not linked to the evolution of eusociality: ow.ly/xK0150Tvbv6 #ProcB #OpenAccess Shubham Gautam @Dorylophile Julian Katzke Paco Hita-Garcia Evan Economo

Seeing Kavita receive the society’s highest honour has had a huge impact, not only in India, but an entire continent of behavioural ecologists. Kavita may well be the first from Asia to receive the accolade but, through the researchers she has inspired, Kavita won’t be the last.

🆕Original Article: Temporary social parasitism in the ant 𝑆𝑡𝑟𝑢𝑚𝑖𝑔𝑒𝑛𝑦𝑠 𝑚𝑢𝑡𝑖𝑐𝑎: colony composition and behavioral interactions with host species 𝑆𝑡𝑟𝑢𝑚𝑖𝑔𝑒𝑛𝑦𝑠 𝑠𝑜𝑙𝑖𝑓𝑜𝑛𝑡𝑖𝑠 and 𝑆𝑡𝑟𝑢𝑚𝑖𝑔𝑒𝑛𝑦𝑠 𝑙𝑒𝑤𝑖𝑠𝑖. Mizuno, R. et 𝑎𝑙.

When thinking of the 'model' planktivore on reefs, fusiliers come to mind – their fusiform bodies and large eyes seem built for the job. But are these traits common among most plankton-feeding reef fishes? 🐟 🔗 The story is more nuanced than we thought: doi.org/10.1007/s11160…

Check out our new paper! A massive collaborative effort, with a small contribution from me