David Hu, professor in the Schools of Biological Sciences and Mechanical Engineering, drew on ant behavior in his commentary of a study that examined towering behavior in nematodes.

Ants, which assemble to form buoyant rafts to survive floodwaters, are among the few creatures known to team up like nematodes, said Hu.

“Ants are incredibly sacrificial for one another, and they do not generally fight within the colony,” Hu said. “That’s because of their genetics. They all come from the same queen, so they are like siblings.”

Notably, there has been a lot of interest in studying cooperative animal behaviors among the robotics community, Hu said. It’s possible that one day, he added, information about the complex sociality of creatures like nematodes could be used to inform how technology, such as computer servers or drone systems, communicates.