Various

...

Methods

Purpose of models in biology

Dornhaus A, Smith B, Hristova K, Buckley L 2021, ‘How can we fully realize the potential of mathematical and biological models to reintegrate biology?’, Integrative and Comparative Biology: icab142 - pdf - outcome of an NSF-sponsored workshop on ‘Reintegrating Biology’; argues that many researchers (modelers and empiricists alike) would benefit from more clearly defining what the purpose of (their) models is and can be, and distinguishing between explanatory, forecast, and statistical models (which have and need different levels of detail/generality, and where in each case the word ‘predicts’ means a qualitatively different thing)

Network analysis

Blonder B, Wey TW, Dornhaus A, James R, Sih A ‘Temporal dynamics and network analysis’, Methods in Ecology and Evolution 3: 958-972 - pdf - review paper on the benefits of adding a time component to network analysis, and review of existing analysis tools as well as an accompanying package particularly geared towards animal social network analysis (analysis of dynamical, time-ordered interactions, such as directional information flow through a network)

ABCTracker

not yet peer reviewed: Rice L, Tate S, Farynyk D, Sun J, Chism G, Charbonneau D, Fasciano T, Dornhaus A, Shin MC 2020 ‘ABCTracker: an easy-to-use, cloud-based application for tracking multiple objects’, arXiv preprint - pdf - ABCTracker newest iteration & description

Nguyen H, Fasciano T, Charbonneau D, Dornhaus A, Shin MC 2014 ‘Data Association Based Ant Tracking with Interactive Error Correction’; WACV 2014: IEEE Winter Conference on Applications of Computer Vision (peer reviewed conference paper) - pdf - ABCTracker development - this tracker has the unique advance of allowing user corrections after tracking with an easy-to-use graphical interface, and with ML help in identifying the most crucial/uncertain places to be checked by the user first, to effectively make use of the user’s manual time investment

Rice L, Dornhaus A, Shin MC 2015 ‘Efficient Training of Multiple Ant Tracking’, WACV 2015: IEEE Winder Conference on Applications of Computer Vision (peer-reviewed conference paper) - pdf - ABCTracker advances, now particularly better tracking with much less training data

Fasciano T, Dornhaus A, Shin MC 2015 ‘Multiple Insect Tracking with Occlusion Sub-tunnels’, WACV 2015: IEEE Winder Conference on Applications of Computer Vision (peer-reviewed conference paper) - pdf -

Fasciano T, Dornhaus A, Shin MC 2014 ‘Ant Tracking with Occlusion Tunnels’; WACV 2014: IEEE Winter Conference on Applications of Computer Vision (peer reviewed conference paper) - pdf - improved tracking in ABCTracker

Fasciano T, Nguyen H, Dornhaus A, Shin MC 2013 ‘Tracking multiple ants in a colony’, Applications of Computer Vision (WACV), 2013 IEEE Workshop pp.534-540 (peer reviewed conference paper) - pdf - ABCTracker advances

Fletcher M, Dornhaus A, Shin MC 2011 ‘Multiple Ant Tracking with Global Foreground Maximization and Variable Target Proposal Distribution’, WACV '11 Proceedings of the 2011 IEEE Workshop on Applications of Computer Vision WACV p570-576 (peer reviewed conference paper) - pdf - initial ABCTracker paper focusing on the task of tracking large numbers of often-occluded and similar-looking ants

Ecology

Ferguson HM, Dornhaus A, Beeche A, Borgemeister C, Gottlieb M, Mulla MS, Gimnig JE, Fish D, Killeen GF 2010 ‘Ecology: a prerequisite for Malaria elimination and eradication’, PLoS Medicine 7: e1000303 - pdf - forum article resulting from a Gates Foundation workgroup, arguing that mosquito ecology is poorly understood, but essential to full malaria eradication (and perhaps to significant progress in that area)

Jones EI, Dornhaus A 2011 'Predation risk makes bees reject rewarding flowers and reduce foraging activity', Behavioral Ecology and Sociobiology 65: 1505-1511 - pdf - empirical paper on bumble bees in which bees were squeezed with forceps to simulate a (failed) predation attempt

Huang MH, Dornhaus A 2008 ‘A meta-analysis of ant social parasitism: host characteristics of different parasitism types and a test of Emery's rule’ Ecological Entomology 33: 589-596 - pdf - comparative analysis shows social parasites are closely related to their hosts (Emery’s rule) in inquilinism and temporary parasitism, but not in dulosis and xenobiosis, indicating the different social parasite types may have different evolutionary origins. Chemical mimicry may allow invasion of large host colonies IF parasites are closely related to hosts and concentrate on a single host species; other social parasites may use a variety of mimicry or invasion strategies (an erratum provides the supplementary information, which was not linked in the original publication).

not yet peer reviewed: Bengston SE, Dornhaus A, Rabeling C 2024 ‘The discovery of mixed colonies in Temnothorax ants supports the territoriality hypothesis of dulotic social parasite evolution in myrmicine ants’, bioRxiv - pdf - northern US populations of Temnothorax live under high competition for nest sites, and we find here that they often contain mixed-species colonies, probably resulting from indiscriminate brood robbing from other congeneric colonies.

Bengston SE, Dornhaus A 2013 ‘Colony size does not predict foraging distance in the ant Temnothorax rugatulus: a puzzle for standard scaling models’, Insectes sociaux 60: 93-96 - pdf - following individual workers in the field, we find a median foraging distance of ~1.5m in the leaf litter for T. rugatulus ants, but no significant differences between colonies or correlation with colony size. Possibly this indicates weak selection on foraging efficiency in this species.

not yet peer reviewed: McWaters SR, Popp S, Rivera MD, Mendoza F, Dornhaus A 2024 ‘Inexperienced bumble bees are poor at securely landing regardless of flower orientation or presence of labellum’, bioRxiv - pdf - a good proportion of bumble bee landing attempts on artificial flowers (flat, vertical, or with a labellum) are unsuccessful and need to be re-attempted, possibly >30%. Flower morphology does not seem to make a difference, but larger bees were slightly more likely to fail.