Dynamical Models of Task Organization in Social Insect Colonies

Abstract

The organizations of insect societies, such as division of labor, task allocation, collective regulation, mass action responses, have been considered as main reasons for the ecological success. In this article, we propose and study a general modeling framework that includes the following three features: (a) the average internal response threshold for each task (the internal factor); (b) social network communications that could lead to task switching (the environmental factor); and (c) dynamical changes of task demands (the external factor). Since workers in many social insect species exhibit age polyethism, we also extend our model to incorporate age polyethism in which worker task preferences change with age. We apply our general modeling framework to the cases of two task groups: the inside colony task versus the outside colony task. Our analytical study of the models provides important insights and predictions on the effects of colony size, social communication, and age related task preferences on task allocation and division of labor in the adaptive dynamical environment. Our study implies that the smaller size colony invests its resource for the colony growth and allocates more workers in the risky tasks such as foraging while the larger colony shifts more workers to perform the safer tasks inside the colony. Social interactions among different task groups play an important role in shaping task allocation depending on the relative cost and demands of the tasks.

A MATHEMATICAL FRAMEWORK EXHIBITING THE EMERGENCE OF DYNAMIC EXPANSION OF TASK REPERTOIRE INPHEIDOLE DENTATA

“…Furthermore, we attempt to do so in a broad manner, so that other observed DOL related features may arise as emergent phenomena, at least under certain parameter settings. We note that the very recent mathematical work in [18] may provide significant insight for age-polyethism.…”

How Approaches to Animal Swarm Intelligence Can Improve the Study of Collective Intelligence in Human Teams

“…Studies of ant colonies have long focused on the mechanisms through which self-organized division of labor allows a colony to meet its requirements and adjust to its changing needs (Beshers and Fewell 2000). For example, differential equation models have been used to model task allocation in social insects by taking into account the different thresholds individuals have for working on available tasks, the need for a given task to be completed, and communication between individuals regarding the need to complete these tasks (Kang and Theraulaz 2016). Such models could be applied to studies of teamwork with interrelated task demands, such as surgical teams or engineering design teams.…”

A computational model of task allocation in social insects: ecology and interactions alone can drive specialisation

“…They live in elaborately organised colonies, capable of managing a complex network of simultaneous tasks, from scouting and foraging to colony defence, nest building, thermoregulation, and brood care. One of the key factors for their ecological success is the colony's ability to efficiently allocate its workforce to these different tasks, responding to frequent changes in external conditions and internal requirements (Charbonneau et al 2013;Grimaldi and Engel 2005;Hölldobler and Wilson 2009;Oster and Wilson 1978;Hölldobler and Wilson 1990;Charbonneau and Dornhaus 2015a;Duarte et al 2011;Fewell and Harrison 2016;Gordon 1996Gordon , 2016Kang and Theraulaz 2016;Mersch 2016;Robinson 1992). Individual workers select their tasks without any central coordination or control.…”