An invasive species of ant, known as the "crazy ant," is displacing fire ants in the southeastern US by secreting a substance that neutralizes fire ant venom, according to a University of Texas at Austin study published this week in the journal Science Express. This is the first known instance of one insect having the ability to detoxify another insect's venom.
The crazy ants come from the southern hemisphere, and are an invasive species of unknown environmental consequences.
Known to humans because of their painful stings, fire ants usually kill other ant species with their powerful venom. "A topical insecticide, the venom is two to three times as toxic as DDT on a per weight basis," according to a press release announcing the findings.
The process undergone by a crazy ant when it is smeared with fire ant venom is described for the first time in the study. The ant secretes formic acid from a gland in its abdomen and then transfers it to the rest of its body.
"In lab experiments, exposed crazy ants that were allowed to detoxify themselves had a 98 percent survival rate. This chemical counter-weapon makes crazy ants nearly invincible in skirmishes with fire ants over food resources and nesting sites," writes the release.
"As this plays out, unless something new and different happens, crazy ants are going to displace fire ants from much of the southeastern US and become the new ecologically dominant invasive ant species," said Ed LeBrun, a research associate with the Texas invasive species research program at the Brackenridge Field Laboratory in UT Austin's College of Natural Sciences.
Last year the researchers reported that the presence of crazy ants lead to a decrease of a number of other arthropods, which is likely to have an effect on the whole ecosystem.
Watch a video of the detoxification process below: