Dynamics of collective decision making of honeybees in complex temperature fields.

Endothermic heat production is a crucial evolutionary adaptation that is, amongst others, responsible for the great success of honeybees. Endothermy ensures the survival of the colonies in harsh environments and is involved in the maintenance of the brood nest temperature, which is fundamental for t...

Descripción completa

Guardado en:

Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores principales:	Martina Szopek, Thomas Schmickl, Ronald Thenius, Gerald Radspieler, Karl Crailsheim
Formato:	article
Lenguaje:	EN
Publicado:	Public Library of Science (PLoS) 2013
Materias:	Medicine R Science Q
Acceso en línea:	https://doaj.org/article/d15791489e554c2cb5785ba2f620f971
Etiquetas:	Agregar Etiqueta Sin Etiquetas, Sea el primero en etiquetar este registro!

id	oai:doaj.org-article:d15791489e554c2cb5785ba2f620f971
record_format	dspace
spelling	oai:doaj.org-article:d15791489e554c2cb5785ba2f620f9712021-11-18T08:50:50ZDynamics of collective decision making of honeybees in complex temperature fields.1932-620310.1371/journal.pone.0076250https://doaj.org/article/d15791489e554c2cb5785ba2f620f9712013-01-01T00:00:00Zhttps://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/pmid/24146843/?tool=EBIhttps://doaj.org/toc/1932-6203Endothermic heat production is a crucial evolutionary adaptation that is, amongst others, responsible for the great success of honeybees. Endothermy ensures the survival of the colonies in harsh environments and is involved in the maintenance of the brood nest temperature, which is fundamental for the breeding and further development of healthy individuals and thus the foraging and reproduction success of this species. Freshly emerged honeybees are not yet able to produce heat endothermically and thus developed behavioural patterns that result in the location of these young bees within the warm brood nest where they further develop and perform tasks for the colony. Previous studies showed that groups of young ectothermic honeybees exposed to a temperature gradient collectively aggregate at the optimal place with their preferred temperature of 36 °C but most single bees do not locate themselves at the optimum. In this work we further investigate the behavioural patterns that lead to this collective thermotaxis. We tested single and groups of young bees concerning their ability to discriminate a local from a global temperature optimum and, for groups of bees, analysed the speed of the decision making process as well as density dependent effects by varying group sizes. We found that the majority of tested single bees do not locate themselves at the optimum whereas sufficiently large groups of bees are able to collectively discriminate a suboptimal temperature spot and aggregate at 36 °C. Larger groups decide faster than smaller ones, but in larger groups a higher percentage of bees may switch to the sub-optimum due to crowding effects. We show that the collective thermotaxis is a simple but well evolved, scalable and robust social behaviour that enables the collective of bees to perform complex tasks despite the limited abilities of each individual.Martina SzopekThomas SchmicklRonald TheniusGerald RadspielerKarl CrailsheimPublic Library of Science (PLoS)articleMedicineRScienceQENPLoS ONE, Vol 8, Iss 10, p e76250 (2013)
institution	DOAJ
collection	DOAJ
language	EN
topic	Medicine R Science Q
spellingShingle	Medicine R Science Q Martina Szopek Thomas Schmickl Ronald Thenius Gerald Radspieler Karl Crailsheim Dynamics of collective decision making of honeybees in complex temperature fields.
description	Endothermic heat production is a crucial evolutionary adaptation that is, amongst others, responsible for the great success of honeybees. Endothermy ensures the survival of the colonies in harsh environments and is involved in the maintenance of the brood nest temperature, which is fundamental for the breeding and further development of healthy individuals and thus the foraging and reproduction success of this species. Freshly emerged honeybees are not yet able to produce heat endothermically and thus developed behavioural patterns that result in the location of these young bees within the warm brood nest where they further develop and perform tasks for the colony. Previous studies showed that groups of young ectothermic honeybees exposed to a temperature gradient collectively aggregate at the optimal place with their preferred temperature of 36 °C but most single bees do not locate themselves at the optimum. In this work we further investigate the behavioural patterns that lead to this collective thermotaxis. We tested single and groups of young bees concerning their ability to discriminate a local from a global temperature optimum and, for groups of bees, analysed the speed of the decision making process as well as density dependent effects by varying group sizes. We found that the majority of tested single bees do not locate themselves at the optimum whereas sufficiently large groups of bees are able to collectively discriminate a suboptimal temperature spot and aggregate at 36 °C. Larger groups decide faster than smaller ones, but in larger groups a higher percentage of bees may switch to the sub-optimum due to crowding effects. We show that the collective thermotaxis is a simple but well evolved, scalable and robust social behaviour that enables the collective of bees to perform complex tasks despite the limited abilities of each individual.
format	article
author	Martina Szopek Thomas Schmickl Ronald Thenius Gerald Radspieler Karl Crailsheim
author_facet	Martina Szopek Thomas Schmickl Ronald Thenius Gerald Radspieler Karl Crailsheim
author_sort	Martina Szopek
title	Dynamics of collective decision making of honeybees in complex temperature fields.
title_short	Dynamics of collective decision making of honeybees in complex temperature fields.
title_full	Dynamics of collective decision making of honeybees in complex temperature fields.
title_fullStr	Dynamics of collective decision making of honeybees in complex temperature fields.
title_full_unstemmed	Dynamics of collective decision making of honeybees in complex temperature fields.
title_sort	dynamics of collective decision making of honeybees in complex temperature fields.
publisher	Public Library of Science (PLoS)
publishDate	2013
url	https://doaj.org/article/d15791489e554c2cb5785ba2f620f971
work_keys_str_mv	AT martinaszopek dynamicsofcollectivedecisionmakingofhoneybeesincomplextemperaturefields AT thomasschmickl dynamicsofcollectivedecisionmakingofhoneybeesincomplextemperaturefields AT ronaldthenius dynamicsofcollectivedecisionmakingofhoneybeesincomplextemperaturefields AT geraldradspieler dynamicsofcollectivedecisionmakingofhoneybeesincomplextemperaturefields AT karlcrailsheim dynamicsofcollectivedecisionmakingofhoneybeesincomplextemperaturefields
_version_	1718421288880439296

Dynamics of collective decision making of honeybees in complex temperature fields.

Ejemplares similares