1. Use of radio-tagging to map spatial organization and social interactions in insects.
- Author
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Moreau, Mathieu, Arrufat, Patrick, Latil, Gerard, and Jeanson, Raphael
- Subjects
- *
ANT ecology , *ANIMAL social behavior , *INSECT societies , *RADIO frequency identification systems , *ANIMAL populations - Abstract
Understanding of the organization of animal societies often requires knowledge of the identity of group members and their spatial location. We propose an original experimental design to track automatically the position of individuals using radio frequency identification technology (RFID). Ants equipped with passive transponders were detected by a reader mounted on a mobile arm moving across the nest surface. We developed an algorithm to accurately extract the positions of individuals moving in two dimension's. Our method was validated on synthetic test cases and then used for characterization of the spatial distribution of ants within nests. This approach provides an amenable system for monitoring large populations of individuals over long periods of time. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]
- Published
- 2011
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