Laterality
<p>Left or right? Like humans, bees also show a preference. Australian researchers have recently discovered that bees can have a left- or right-side preference—affecting their flight decisions in order to avoid obstacles.</p>
<p>The human brain consists of two hemispheres that are roughly symmetrical in terms of morphology. Functionally, however, there is marked asymmetry: most of us are right-handed, and everyday objects are designed for right-handed users—the pair of scissors, the tape measure, the computer mouse, the guitar, the graduated jug, the fold-down writing tablet attached to an auditorium chair, the stock of a hunting rifle, the boomerang… not to mention the convention of the handshake.</p>
<p>A recent study reveals that while 50% of bees are not lateralised, 25% are right-biased and 25% are left-biased. One hypothesis proposed to explain this phenomenon is that swarm flight strategies are optimised, thereby avoiding a proportion of collisions.</p>
Most humans are right-handed, but what about bees? A new study conducted by researchers from the University of Queensland in Australia, led by Professor Mandyam Srinivasan, suggests that around one quarter of bees are also right-biased, while another quarter are “left-biased”. The remaining half, by contrast, shows no preference. These findings are particularly intriguing as they may have implications for the control of future fleets of aerial drones.
| The researchers set up an experiment in which bees (102 foraging bees) had to travel from the hive to a nearby food source through a 120-centimetre enclosed passage and then return. Along the way, they had to pass through one of two adjacent openings (right or left?). When the openings were the same size, about 55 % of the bees showed no preference for one hole over the other. Of the remaining 45 %, half consistently chose the opening on the left, while the other half chose the one on the right (the bees were individually marked so that they could be distinguished). |  |
The situation changed slightly when the openings were of different sizes. The authors note, however, that the wider an opening was, the more likely bees were to choose it. That said, “biased” bees took longer to make a decision when the wider opening was not the one they would normally have chosen. In other words, “right-biased” bees passed through the left opening when it was the wider one, but took longer to make this decision, which was counter-intuitive for them. The same applied in reverse for “left-biased” bees with the right opening.
According to the scientists, this system of “left-” and “right-biased” individuals could benefit bee swarms. If all bees had no bias at all, there would be a risk that a large majority would attempt to take the same path through foliage. This would slow them down and increase the likelihood of wing damage caused by collisions. The fact that some favour the right and others the left therefore helps to limit such damage. This optimised flight strategy could also potentially assist future fleets of autonomous drones when flying through foliage or other obstacles. Details of this study were published in the journal PLOS ONE.