“I study ants in the desert, in the tropical forest and in my kitchen,” says Deborah Gordon. An ecologist, she researches the behavior of ant colonies — which are systems that operate without central control. (While they have a queen, Gordon explains, the queen only lays eggs and doesn’t actually issue orders.) Gordon thinks that, from […]
We at TED have a new addition to the office: a space-age ant farm! The Ant Column Cylinder Ant Farm arrived at our office last week. It’s a six-inch tube filled with a nutrient-rich blue goo. We added ants ordered from Ants Alive into the equation and within a few hours, the ants had built […]
As E.O. Wilson accepts his 2007 TED Prize, he makes a plea on behalf of his constituents, the insects and small creatures, to learn more about our biosphere. We know so little about nature, he says, that we’re still discovering tiny organisms indispensable to life; and yet we’re steadily, methodically, vigorously destroying nature. Wilson identifies […]