Cemeteries are known locations of an abundance of human bones. But cemeteries are not the only site where human bones have been deposited, in both modern and ancient times, and investigations of such bones, wherever they are found, can often tell us a lot about traumatic injuries, environmental changes, cultural histories, and a number of other phenomenon that might interest anthropologists, including forensic anthropologists. However, interpreting bones can be difficult. Various destructive factors can change the shape and other features of bones over time, and thus the more we know about processes of bone destruction, the more we can know about the other phenomena associated with the bones.

And here’s where the ants come in. A paper published earlier this year, in Forensic Entomology, formally reports a discovery that previously had only been the subject of speculation and anecdotes: direct modification of human bones… by ants.

There is an African ant species of tiny workers that lives in big trees. In these big trees, […]

One of the more stunning biological discoveries to date is that organisms like ants are not merely individual organisms, but also hosts to trillions of bacteria. Some biologists have increasingly focused on this “microbiome”, and naturally work in ants is no exception. A few months ago, a group of ant researchers discovered yet another cool thing about ants and their microbiome!

If you’re anything like us, you’ve been spending a lot of time lately wondering about ant species coexistence. How can there possibly be 13,384 species of ants, when so many species have overlapping niches in space, food resources, and other traits? Shouldn’t the most competitive ant species ultimately drive all the others to extinction?