These tools will no longer be maintained as of December 31, 2024. Archived website can be found here. PubMed4Hh GitHub repository can be found here. Contact NLM Customer Service if you have questions.


Pubmed for Handhelds

PUBMED FOR HANDHELDS

Search MEDLINE/PubMed

  • Title: Surface irregularity induced-tunneling behavior of the formosan subterranean termite.
    Author: Lee SH, Yang RL, Su NY.
    Journal: Behav Processes; 2008 Jul; 78(3):473-6. PubMed ID: 18343049.
    Abstract:
    Subterranean termites forage from place to place by tunneling through soil. In order to examine termite-tunneling responses to external factors, we designed a square arena that contains five introduction chambers connected with narrow paths, which was filled with sand. Triangle-shaped indentation with width W and height H was provided as surface irregularity on the sand facing the introduction chambers by using templates. After termites were introduced into the chambers, we measured elapsed time, tau, for a tunnel to reach the point at 3 mm away from the apex of the irregularity. We found that for W=0 mm (the absence of irregularity), termites (Coptotermes formosanus Shiraki) did not tunnel for approximately 7h, whereas, for W=1, 2, 3, and 4 mm, they exhibited the tunneling behavior within 20 min. The result indicated that the presence of surface irregularity is essential to induce termite tunneling. In addition, we found that W was correlated with tau, whereas H did not influence tau. This was briefly discussed in the context of individual movement behavior.
    [Abstract] [Full Text] [Related] [New Search]