Sensible Erection | The Real Alien Ant Farm

Sunday, 21 March 2010

quote [ NASA technology and macrophotography come together to produce a stunning set of images of the real alien ant farm. ]

Cool, I want one.

http://www.discoverthis.com/gel-ant-farm.html

[sci&tech] [by JOECAM@11:57pmGMT] [+10 Interesting]

Comments

afrasr said @ 12:13am GMT on 22nd Mar

ComposerNate said @ 12:27am GMT on 22nd Mar [Score:5 Funny]

f00m@nB@r said @ 3:13am GMT on 22nd Mar

f00m@nB@r said @ 12:31am GMT on 22nd Mar
http://www.amazon.com/Fascinations-ANTW1-Antworks-Ant-Farm/dp/B0006FSEOI

swiggy said @ 12:36am GMT on 22nd Mar
but the question is, can they be trained to manipulate tiny screws in space?

damnit said @ 12:45am GMT on 22nd Mar
It was definitely interesting, but the final zoomed out picture was kind of a let down. I was expecting something more "alien" so to speak. Nice build up, though.

Krutz said @ 1:07am GMT on 22nd Mar [Score:1 Informative]

damnit said @ 1:30am GMT on 22nd Mar
This looked more alien, granted it's bigger and probably took years to create.

Barnabas_Truman said @ 1:53am GMT on 22nd Mar
Once again I am reminded of Dwarf Fortress.

f00m@nB@r said @ 1:57am GMT on 22nd Mar [Score:1 Interesting]

damnit said @ 2:10am GMT on 22nd Mar
They don't explain what happened to the ants. Massacred?

f00m@nB@r said @ 2:15am GMT on 22nd Mar
yeah.

spite48 said @ 2:43am GMT on 22nd Mar
Buried alive in concrete - exactly the way I want to go.

Dragons_wine said @ 3:50am GMT on 22nd Mar [Score:1 Informative]
The guy I heard about that did this was careful to make sure the ant had abandoned the nest first. Or that's what he said anyway.

OrionJc said @ 6:38am GMT on 22nd Mar
It's the same Professor. It was previously on History Channel, an episode of Modern Marvels called Nature's Engineers. He stressed that he only worked with abandoned nests, which is why it was curious to hear otherwise.

nbob said @ 7:05am GMT on 22nd Mar [Score:1 Funny]
Strangely, the ant-calendar for this particular colony stops at exactly Midnight, December 21, 2012

robotroadkill said @ 3:32am GMT on 22nd Mar
The title says "worlds biggest ant hill" but I know an entomologist who has asked this guy about "excavating the big ant colonies" and he said "Oh, we don't excavate the big ones!"

damnit said @ 5:26am GMT on 22nd Mar [Score:1 Informative]
I watched the full documentary and they said they made sure this particular ant hill was already abandoned. Hope that's true.

papango said @ 6:41am GMT on 22nd Mar
Me too. I don't want some guy going around pissing off these superorganisms.

cb361 said @ 3:02am GMT on 22nd Mar [Score:1 Insightful]
They've been selling NASA ant gel farms on eBay for years.

phlegm said @ 4:06am GMT on 22nd Mar [Score:2 Interesting]
My nephew had one a while back.

Within a month, all of the ants had died except for one. He spent his days dragging the dead to to the surface. Once they were all on top, he wandered the tunnels all day. It was like I Am Legend for ants. Depressing as all hell too.

Barnabas_Truman said @ 4:35am GMT on 22nd Mar
That definitely sounds like Dwarf Fortress.

shiney things said @ 3:51am GMT on 23rd Mar
This is making me unreasonably sad. Not cool!

backSLIDER said @ 3:04am GMT on 22nd Mar
Hasn't this been in stores for a while? I remember my buddy having one and I think that was in high school.

damnit said @ 5:28am GMT on 22nd Mar
I think the difference is that they actually took this in one of the shuttle missions and observed how ants create tunnels in zero gravity.

swiggy said @ 8:27am GMT on 22nd Mar
conclusions: more or less the same, by the looks of things.

Barnabas_Truman said @ 10:41am GMT on 22nd Mar
Apparently they tunnels made in microgravity are wigglier. Perhaps the diggers use gravitational sense as a directional stabilizer to ensure that they're digging in straight lines?

nbob said @ 11:20pm GMT on 22nd Mar
Perhaps they're disoriented because they're in zero gravity?

Barnabas_Truman said @ 12:14am GMT on 23rd Mar
New NASA studies reveal: zero gravity is confusing.

Rapscallion said @ 6:13pm GMT on 25th Mar
Dang. I saw those pictures and thought the ants were building free-floating tubes from the gel for a hive. I kind of feel cheated.