These Ants Shrink Their Brains for a Chance to Become Queen

If their bids at motherhood fail, they can then regrow their brains.

The Indian jumping ant, Harpegnathos saltator, has many talents. This inch-long arthropod, found in flood plains across India, has a four-inch vertical leap and the ability to take down prey nearly twice its size. If that wasn’t enough, these amazing ants can also adjust the size of their own brains. In a study, published Wednesday in the journal Proceedings of the Royal Society B, scientists found that Indian jumping ants can shrink their brains by nearly 20 percent and unshrink them in a matter of weeks. Although other insects, including honeybees, have been known to possess the ability to increase their brain size, the Indian jumping ant is the first insect known to be capable of both increases and decreases in brain size. The researchers behind the study say that females of the ant species use this ability to prepare their bodies for reproduction. Like most ant colonies, those of Indian jumping ants consist of a queen, males for reproduction and an all-female worker class. The queen holds the most coveted position in the colony. Not only do queens get waited on hand and foot by worker ants, but they also live more than five times longer. And in a typical colony, the queen is the only female that is allowed to have offspring.