Pharmantcology

Anyone who is a human living in a human society knows that social life carries with it the risk of catching a disease from other nearby humans. Of course, this is also the case for ants in their societies. But a fascinating paper in Ecology and Evolution has recently revealed another commonality: some wood ants, like humans, create antimicrobial drugs. To learn more, check out this nice discussion in Science.

Formica
Fomica wood ants, cluelessly spreading harmful bacteria? Photo: Alex Wild