Nature is ingenious in its survival mechanisms, and when it comes to the microscopic world, small creatures can possess great powers. Danish researchers analyzed the behavior of ants and discovered that a worm inhabiting these insects can “control their minds” to ensure their entire life cycle.
The study, published in the journal Behavioral Ecology, explains that after infecting ants, Dicrocoelium dendriticum attaches itself to the insects’ brains, causing them to engage in “suicidal behavior.” Because the ants climb to the tops of the blades of grass, they are eventually eaten by cattle and deer, animals in which the worm lodges in the liver to complete its development.
The worm’s control over ants is sophisticated: the insects only climb onto the blades of grass during mild temperatures in the morning and evening, when the mammals seeking to harbor the Dicrococelium are normally grazing.
The fact that ants follow the habits of their hosts and thus increase the chances of success in the reproductive cycle also ensures that ants and with them the worms stay alive if they avoid very hot times.
Once the worm and its eggs enter mammals, they are excreted in the feces of these animals. Snails act as a second host in which the worm develops into larvae and is excreted through the mucus of these invertebrates. Then the ants come and eat this slime.
“We found a clear connection between temperature and ant behavior. We joke about finding the ant zombie ‘click,’” Brian Lund Fredensborg, coauthor of the paper and associate professor of organic biology at the University of Copenhagen, said in a statement.
In an interview with Newsweek magazine, the researcher commented on the ingenuity of the natural scheme of living organisms.
“In our study, we found that temperature is the trigger that activates or deactivates altered behavior [das formigas]. However, we still need to define the exact mechanism. It may be that the parasite migrating to the ant’s brain stimulates increased levels of neuromodulators [serotonina e dopamina] temperature dependent, but this needs to be checked.”
Although these worms can infect humans, they cannot infect our brains like ants. “Humans are not part of the normal life cycle of this parasite and if they are, they are not part of the normal life cycle of this parasite [raramente] If something were to happen, it would be at the site of the mammalian host, where there are no behavioral changes,” Fredensborg said.