How To Be King of The Giant Ants!

A European caterpillar can garner royal treatment from ants by mimicking the sound of their queen.

Ants of the species Myrmica schencki can be fooled into carrying certain caterpillars into the colony nurseries where the fakers enjoy full care and five-star dining, and then turns into a Maculinea rebeli butterfly.

Chemical camouflage alone will let the caterpillars game their way into the ant colony. But, the rhythmic caterpillar purring has the effect of the queen ant’s noises.

M. rebeli caterpillars make a mini version of the brrrrrr of a woodcock or snipe, Thomas says. Recent work has suggested that caterpillar noises may come from repeated muscle spasms. And when caterpillars become enclosed pupae, they make noises by rubbing a scraper, or plectrum, on their abdomen against a patch of fine grooves called a file. “Actually they can wriggle their abdomen quite a bit,” Thomas says.

A caterpillar has fooled ants into feeding it during the final stages before it turns into a large blue butterfly. Photo: Jeremy Thomas

Advances in miniature electronics made the new study possible. When playing the caterpillar recordings to an ant colony, workers reacted as they do to queen scratchings. Most distinctive was what Thomas describes as on-guard attendance.

Clustering around the speaker, worker ants stay motionless in a hunched-over posture with antennae out and jaws slightly open. Like an honor guard around a human queen, worker ants will maintain that pose for hours.

Queen-mimicry could explain the VIP treatment caterpillars receive in the ant colony. “Quite often they’re treated as superior beings,” Thomas says. In a crisis, worker ants rescue caterpillars before a regular ant brood. And in famine, workers will kill their own brood and feed it to the caterpillar.

Ref.: Queen Ants Make Distinctive Sounds That Are Mimicked by a Butterfly Social Parasite. 2009. F. Barbero, et al. Science 323: 782–785.

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Superman’s Pal, Jimmy Olsen #54 (July), 1961 © DC Comics
Robert Bernstein: Script; Curt Swan: Pencils: Stan Kaye: Inks

Ancient Hot Springs of Mars May Hold Life

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Data from the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) suggest the discovery of ancient springs in the Vernal Crater, sites where life forms may have evolved on Mars.

Hot springs have great astrobiological significance, as the closest relatives of many of the most ancient organisms on Earth can thrive in and around hydrothermal springs. If life forms have ever been present on Mars, hot spring deposits would be ideal locations to search for physical or chemical evidence of these organisms and could be target areas for future exploratory missions.

Structures in Vernal Crater that appear to have arisen as part of a major area of ancient spring activity. The data suggest that the southern part of Vernal Crater has experienced episodes of water flow from underground to the surface and may be a site where martian life could have developed.

Such deposits on Earth preserve evidence of the fossilized remains of the microbial communities that inhabited the hot springs over a wide range of spatial scales. Hot spring fluids are typically laden with dissolved mineral ions that, when they precipitate out and create the hydrothermal deposit, enhance fossilization of all types of biosignatures.

Ref. “A Case for Ancient Springs in Arabia Terra, Mars. 2009. C. C. Allen and D.Z. Oehler. Astrobiology 8. 1093-1172.

HOW TO BUILD A MARTIAN


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The Architects of Fear!

Cave Carson: Adventures Inside Earth!

Cave Carson's first adventure!
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The Brave and the Bold #31 (August-September 1960). Cave Carson © DC Comics

Script: France Herron; Art by the great Bruno Premiani

Hey DC! Where’s my Cave Carson Archives?!

Smallest Transiting Extrasolar Planet Found

Scientists have discovered a planet only twice as large as the Earth orbiting a star slightly smaller than the Sun. It is the smallest extrasolar planet planet outside our solar system whose radius has ever been measured. The planet's composition is not yet certain, but it is probably made predominantly of rock and water. It orbits its host star in 20 hours, which is the shortest orbital period of all exoplanets found so far. Astronomers infer its temperature must be so high (over 1000 C°) that it should be covered in lava or superheated water vapour.

Most of the 330 or so exoplanets discovered so far are giant planets, primarily composed of gas, like Jupiter and Neptune. This new object, named CoRoT-Exo-7b, is very different. "Finding such a small planet wasn't a complete surprise", says Dr Daniel Rouan. "It could be an example of a so-called ocean planet, whose existence was predicted some years ago: a Neptune-like planet, made of ice around a rocky core, drifts so close to its star, the ice the melting to form a fluid envelope."

Such a small planets such as this one is extremely difficult to detect. CoRoT-Exo-7b was found because it passes in front of its host star, causing the star to dim very slightly once per orbit – a so-called transit, which in this case is only 0.03% deep. link

The Black Wolf: The 1st Genetically Modified Predator

Art by Frank Frazetta. Creepy © current copyright holders

Emergence of black-colored wolves is the direct result of humans raising dogs as pets and beasts of burden, according to new. And dark coloring may also aid the survival of the species as wolf habitat is affected by climate change in the future.

Using genetic analysis of gray wolf populations from North America and Europe, the researchers traced the source of the dominant gene responsible for dark coat color in wolves to domesticated dogs and conclude the trait was passed to the gray wolf population, as well as to coyotes, by mating between the closely-related wild and domestic canid species. The transition could have taken place as recently as the arrival of European domestic dogs in North America or as long as 14,000 years ago when humans migrated into North America across the Bering Strait.

Since then, black fur has become commonplace in wolf packs, perhaps because snow-covered northern environments are shrinking and darker coloring allows for greater stealth while hunting in areas without snow. While gray wolves can be found in colors ranging from white to gray to black, light-coloration is predominantly found in the arctic tundra where wolves prey on barren ground caribou. The researchers note that the relationship between coat color and habitat is often attributed to adaptation and natural selection, but this is the first example of a genetic modification that likely arose due to human selection becoming adaptive and selected for when back in nature.

"Although it happened by accident, black wolves are the first example of wolves being genetically-engineered by people," said Marco Musiani. "Domestication of dogs has led to dark-colored coats in wolves, which has proven to be a valuable trait for wolf populations as their arctic habitat shrinks," Musiani said. "It also shows that human activities can help enrich the genetic diversity of wild animal populations, which is a very unexpected finding."

Werewolf of London

Ref: Molecular and Evolutionary History of Melanism in North American Gray Wolves. 2009. T. M. Anderson, et al. Science 323: Published Online February 5, 2009.

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Story & art by the great team of Archie Goodwin and Reed Crandell