A new study found that the tiny and seemingly weak fire ants have “superpowers” that they use to create self-healing materials.
Researchers at the Georgia Institute of Technology led by mechanical engineer David Hu studied the ant bridges in Brazil in which they were surprised to see that they are strong enough to survive flash floods and other tough environments. They wondered why instead of falling apart, the ant bridges become stronger instead.
“They live in these places that are flooded, and they have to build things that are resilient to forces because they live in a very abusive environment,” Hu told the L.A Times. “And we want to understand what the properties of this material [are] that allows them to respond to these environments.”
A typical fire ant colony produces large mounds in open areas and eats plants, seeds, and crickets. They are usually found on damp areas with soil such as river banks, ponds, and watered lawns. Sometimes, they build their houses in logs, timber, rocks, and bricks. It is considered an invasive pest in the U.S, Australia, Philippines, China, and Taiwan.
This new discovery may make the fire ants useful to scientists as they plan to study the technique used by the fire ants in making strong ant bridges which seem to have its own self-healing materials. The knowledge may be used to invent self-repairing bridges and self-assembling robots.
The self-healing materials they saw in fire ants come in liquid and solid properties. When compressed, a solid ball of ants will stretch then revert to its original form. But when they tossed a stick on them, they disperse like liquid.
Researchers believe that the fire ants “superpowers” have something to do with how they join together. They link their jaws, arms, and legs and move around together.
“We’ll basically consider it a victory when we know what one ant has to do to make these bridges not fall,” Hu said. “Right now, we just showed that they’re doing interesting things.”
The study was presented at the American Physical Society’s fluid dynamics conference in Pittsburgh.
