We know what you are thinking. Indeed, our production of premier ant content for general consumption has been flagging lately. It’s true, we haven’t posted a non-Philosophy Phridays article in quite a long time. Could it be a conspiracy? Has Big Vertebrate succeeded in silencing our noble cause? Could chemtrails be to blame?

Well, we don’t know much about chemtrails – and our officially stated reason for our relative silence is our staff’s preoccupation with external affairs – but we do know something about chemical trails laid by ants. Thankfully, as shared with us by YouTube Correspondant John Turner, we’re not the only ones: Enter AntBot.

Recent efforts by a team of researchers at Aix-Marseille University (AMU) produced a stellar robot that utilizes the methods of desert ants to navigate in an extraordinarily accurate fashion. As reported in Science Magazine:

That limited brainpower [of desert ants] made it possible for researchers to accomplish the same tasks using relatively simple computer processors. To establish its heading, “AntBot”—which has six insectlike legs and two simple eyes—uses an eye designed to detect the sun’s ultraviolet light and a pair of rotating polarizing filters to determine its relative position. Just like the desert ants, AntBot also counts its steps and monitors the speed of the ground flowing past. In an era where resolution is measured in megapixels, AntBot’s eyes have just 14 pixels between them.

Want to see AntBot in action? Marvel at the video below.