Meeting Abstract
Many social insects that live in large, congested colonies (e.g., some ants and termites) build elaborate physical structures that facilitate passive airflow through the nest. This airflow allows for colony-level gas exchange with the environment and prevents buildup of heat and carbon dioxide within the nest. However, honey bees build their nests in pre-existing cavities, often with single openings, which precludes passive airflow as a reliable mechanism of ventilation. Instead, groups of honey bee workers actively drive air currents through the nest by fanning their wings at the nest entrance. Individual fanning bees can only sense local information and they only make a meager contribution to hive-scale airflow, yet fanning bees collectively structure stable, unidirectional airflow through the nest, with air entering and exiting at different locations within a single opening. We measured air speed, temperature and the density of fanning bees at 14 locations along the entrances of four bee hives, over the course of three days. Our data suggest that asymmetric distributions of fanning bees along the nest entrance allows for continuous inflow and outflow through a single opening. We share our empirical observations and present a mathematical model describing how groups of honey bees organize their ventilation effort by following simple, individual control rules.
