A species of African ant, the Matabale ants, provides its wounded with self-produced antibiotics. As researchers from Lausanne show in a new study, the ants are able to recognize infected wounds and treat them accordingly.
The ants have special glands for this purpose, according to the research that the scientists published on Friday in the journal ‘Nature Communications’. Matabale ants lead dangerous lives. They attack, kill and carry off termites several times a day. When they return to the ant nest, they eat their victims.
Many injured victims during raids
These raids not only cause many victims among the termites, because they defend themselves fiercely. About 22 percent of ants have one or more legs cut off during such an attack, as the authors wrote in the study.
However, the injured ants are saved: fellow ants bring them back to the nest and take care of them. This care can reduce the mortality rate of injured ants by more than 90 percent.
Produce a cocktail of antibiotics
In the study led by Laurent Keller, a former professor at the University of Lausanne, researchers led by Erik Frank showed that ants use a cocktail of antibiotics to care for the injured. These antibiotics are secreted by a special gland unique to ants.
The so-called metapleural gland contains more than 100 proteins and organic compounds that prevent bacteria from developing on the wound and in the body of injured animals. For this purpose, ants use so-called palps, which are located between the jaw pincers, Keller explained to the Keystone-SDA news agency.
Injured animals change body odor
In the study, the researchers also showed that when ants are injured, the profile of hydrocarbons in the insects’ outer protective layer changes. To signal that they need help, injured ants can change their body odor, the researchers explain.
According to Keller, the results could have potentially revolutionary medical implications. “The bacteria that multiply in the injured ants are Pseudomonas, pathogens that often colonize the lungs of weakened patients in hospitals,” the researcher said. “As resistance to conventional antibiotics becomes more common, the discovery of compounds effective against these pathogens could open up new therapeutic options.”
Source: Krone
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