Year: 2006
Type: article
Abstract: Comparative neurobiologists have provided ample evidence that in vertebrates small animals have proportionally larger brains: in a double-logarithmic plot of brain weight versus body weight all data points conform quite closely to a straight line with a slope of less than one. Hence vertebrate brains scale allometrically, rather than isometrically, with body size. Here we extend the phylogenetic scope of such studies and the size range of the brains under investigation to the insects, especially ants. We show that the principle of (negative) allometry applies as well, but that ants have considerably smaller brains than any ant-sized vertebrate would have, and that this result holds even if the relatively higher exoskeleton weights of ants (as compared to endoskeleton weights of mammals) are taken into account. Finally, interspecific comparisons within one genus of ants, Cataglyphis, show that species exhibiting small colony sizes (of a few hundred individuals) have significantly smaller brains than species in which colonies are composed of several thousand individuals.
Source: Brain Behavior and Evolution
DOI: 10.1159/000097057
Authors: Rüdiger Wehner, Tsukasa Fukushi, Karin Isler
Institutions: University of Zurich, Miyagi University of Education
Language: English
Subfield: Insect Science
Domain: Life Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W1966088234