The invention of technical N2 fixation (TNF) opened the way to fertilize urea, NH4+, NO3 plant demands surpassing. An enchased the production sites from the thermodynamic equilibrium moving away and yields significantly increasing soil organic matter (SOM) conversion promotes nitrification through NH4+ and CO2 availability in higher amounts. Mobile NO3 ions in access formed dislocate towards gr...

The function of a network is affected by its structure. For example, the presence of highly interactive individuals, or hubs, influences the extent and rate of information spread across a network. In a network of interactions, the duration over which individual variation in interactions persists may affect how the network operates. Individuals may persist in their behavior over time and across ...

Forest management alters species behaviours, distributions and interactions. To evaluate forestry effects on ant foraging performance, we compared the quality and quantity of honeydew harvested by ants among clear-cuts, middle-aged and mature spruce-dominated stands in boreal forests in Sweden. Honeydew quality was examined using honeydew collected by squeezing the gasters of laden Formica aqui...

Pheromones are a chemical substance produced and released by ants as means of communication. In this work we present the minimum amount of pheromones necessary and sufficient for a colony of ants (identical mobile agents) to deterministically find a food source (treasure), assuming that each ant has the computational capabilities of either a Finite State Machine (FSM) or a Turing Machine (TM). ...

Desert seed-harvester ants, genus Pogonomyrmex, are central place foragers that search for resources collectively. We quantify how seed harvesters exploit the spatial distribution of seeds to improve their rate of seed collection. We find that foraging rates are significantly influenced by the clumpiness of experimental seed baits. Colonies collected seeds from larger piles faster than randomly...

Biologists seek concise, testable models of behavior for the animals they study. We suggest a robot programming paradigm in which animal behaviors are described as robot controllers to support a cycle of hypothesis generation and testing of animal models. In this work we illustrate that approach by modeling the hunting behavior of a captive colony of Aphaenogaster cockerelli, a desert harvester...

Selective foraging by granivores can have important consequences for the structure and composition of plant communities, and potentially severe consequences for rare plant species. To understand how granivore foraging behavior affects common and rare plant species, diet selection should be viewed relative to the availability of alternative seed options, and with consideration of the individual ...