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Science 2 July 2004:
Vol. 305. no. 5680, p. 60
DOI: 10.1126/science.1097165
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Brevia

Path Integration in Desert Ants Controls Aggressiveness

Markus Knaden and Rüdiger Wehner*

Cataglyphis ants of the Sahara Desert are extremely aggressive toward members of other colonies if they are close to their nest entrance, but not once they have embarked on their wide foraging journeys. We show that the ants reach the same level of aggressiveness when they are far from their actual nesting site but their path integrator--their main navigational toolkit--tells them that they are close, indicating a role for the animal's path integrator beyond navigation.

Department of Zoology, University of Zürich, Winterthurerstrasse 190, CH-8057 Zürich, Switzerland.

* To whom correspondence should be addressed. E-mail: rwehner{at}zool.unizh.ch

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Science. ISSN 0036-8075 (print), 1095-9203 (online)