Science Buddies: "Ask an Expert"

Hi,
I am thinking of doing a project about some form of ant behavior. A couple ideas that I have include: Patterns of nest building, methods of finding a new nest (a classic), work delegation in colonies, methods of foraging etc. Is this a good starting point? Are there any major ideas that I'm missing? Also, what are some places that I could find papers about these ideas but on a level that I would be able to grasp?

Thanks in advace,
24601

Hi 24601,

Did you look through Science Buddies' project ideas? I found a few relating to ant behavior: https://www.sciencebuddies.org/science- ... t+behavior

I think your thoughts are a good starting point. You will want to narrow down your project to investigate ONE of those areas. Once you have decided which to work on, start with your hypothesis, then work out how to test it from there. You can use the Prject guide to help you along: https://www.sciencebuddies.org/science- ... ndex.shtml

For papers on the subject - I started in Google with the words "ant behavior research", then read the news articles, which are summaries of the actual research publications. Also Ted talks are good to start with, too. Then you can look for the more complicated papers if you need specific questions answered.

Please let me know if you have more questions. Ants are wonderful to watch and we can learn so much from them!

Tonya