You don’t have to travel to South America to watch leaf-cutter ants at work. Museums and zoos help people take a close-up look at these amazing insects. A large leaf-cutter ant colony lived at the Smithsonian Institution’s National Zoo Invertebrate Exhibit until it closed in 2014. At least 10,000 ants can live within a chamber roughly the size of a shoebox. Large colonies— like the one that was housed at the Invertebrate Exhibit in Washington, DC—often have 15 to 20 such chambers.
Today Alan Peters is in charge of the Reptile Discovery Center. Previously, he was the zoo’s curator of invertebrates, animals with no backbone. Ants are invetebrates.
“I think of [the leaf-cutter colony] as a body, and each ant has a different function,” explains Peters. Just as different organs perform functions in our bodies, ants have particular jobs. “If those workers don’t do their job, then the colony starts to fall apart in the same way our body starts to fall apart when different parts don’t function properly,” he notes.
All Hail the Queen
Esta historia es de la edición July/August 2020 de Muse Science Magazine for Kids.
Comience su prueba gratuita de Magzter GOLD de 7 días para acceder a miles de historias premium seleccionadas y a más de 9,000 revistas y periódicos.
Ya eres suscriptor ? Conectar
Esta historia es de la edición July/August 2020 de Muse Science Magazine for Kids.
Comience su prueba gratuita de Magzter GOLD de 7 días para acceder a miles de historias premium seleccionadas y a más de 9,000 revistas y periódicos.
Ya eres suscriptor? Conectar
Who's Your Cousin?
The great apes are among the most popular animals in most zoos. Their actions, facial expressions, and family life remind us so much of ourselves. Have you ever wondered, though, how we might look to them?
Is it possible to die of boredom?
To figure out if we can die of boredom, we first have to understand what boredom is. For help, we called James Danckert, a psychologist who studies boredom at the University of Waterloo in Canada.
THE PROBLEM WITH PALM OIL
Palm oil is all around you. It’s in sugary snacks like cookies and candy bars. It’s in lipstick and shampoo and pet food.
SERGE WICH
Serge Wich’s favorite days at work are spent out in the forest, studying orangutans in Sumatra and Borneo or chimpanzees in Tanzania.
ELODIE FREYMANN
When you’re feeling sick, it probably doesn’t occur to you to try eating tree bark.
Guardians of the Forest
EARLY, MAKESHIFT WILDLIFE DRONES HELPED TO DETECT AND PROTECT ORANGUTANS.
APE ANTICS
The Whirling World of primate play
Dr. Ape Will See You Now
HUMANS AREN’T THE ONLY PRIMATES THAT USE MEDICATION.
THE LEFT OVERS
A lot has happened for modern humans to get to this point. We lost most of our hair, learned how to make tools, established civilizations, sent a person to the Moon, and invented artificial intelligence. Whew! With all of these changes, our bodies have changed, too. It’s only taken us about six million years.
SO, WHAT IS A PRIMATE?
What do you have in common with the aye-aye, sifaka, siamang, and potto? If you said your collarbone, you re probably a primatologist—a person who studies primates. If you’re not, read on.