About 80 million years ago , several kinds of tropical U. S. Army pismire go underground . Like many preponderantly subterranean coinage , they lost their peck . They also lose the component of the brain consociate with stack .
Eighteen million years ago , a few coinage of army ant — Eciton hamatum , Eciton mexicanum and Eciton burchellii — resurfaced . Researchers from Drexel University have found evidence that they recover their sight , and regrew parts of the brain associated with sight . Theresearch is publishedin the journal The Science of Nature .
test an ant ’s mickle is a ruffianly proposition , so the researchers are n’t able to measure exactly how unspoilt the newly - sighted ants ’ sight is . But there is evidence that the ants ’ ability to see is n’t just a simple recovery of their original visual arrangement .
“ We found anatomical suggestions that their eye structure is distinguishable from most other above - ground insects,”said Sean O’Donnell a prof at Drexel and one of the paper ’s authors . “ The ants may have both regained miss ground and reinvented the mechanism required for tidy sum . ”
The change in the brain was even more noteworthy than the change in the centre . The resighted species had significantly larger optical lobe than their subterranean relatives . The above - ground ants also had expanded the region of their brain that dealt with olfactory property , and had magnanimous mushroom torso calyces , which are associated with memory .
In addition to saying something about our abilities , this also enounce something about our environment . Living above ground , with day and nighttime , and a wider variety of both target and predators , apparently require more brain power than living below terra firma . The possibility of regaining brain is exciting enough . According to O’Donnell , “ Our data on visual investment indicate there is at least some way to regain or increase lose sensory and cognitive function . ”
[ The Science of Nature , Drexel University ]
AnimalsBiologyEvolutionScience
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