Evidence map›Paper›PMID 29230062›Full record

ArticleScientific reports2017

Continuous Radar Tracking Illustrates the Development of Multi-destination Routes of Bumblebees.

Joseph L Woodgate, James C Makinson, Ka S Lim, Andrew M Reynolds, Lars Chittka

Abstract read
In one paragraph

Article in Scientific reports, 2017. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 21 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.

0numbers the graph read from it
0cells of the map it votes in
21citing papers in PubMed, 1 pooled it
–field-weighted citation impact
1 · What the graph read from it

What it found

Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.

The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.

2 · The registry

The trial behind it

Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.

Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.

3 · Its place in the literature

Who cites it

21 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it.

  1. Pooled it
  2. Article
  3. Review
  4. Article
  5. The function of episodic memory in animals.Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · 2024
    Review
  6. Article
  7. Article
  8. Article
  9. Article
  10. Article
  11. The role of food odor in invertebrate foraging.Genes, brain, and behavior · 2022
    Review
  12. Article
  13. Article
  14. Article
  15. Article
  16. From Paths to Routes: A Method for Path Classification.Frontiers in behavioral neuroscience · 2020
    Article
  17. Article
  18. Article
  19. Article
  20. Article
4 · The record

Corrections and comments

PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.

5 · Who and what money

Authors and funding

5 authors.

Joseph L WoodgateDepartment of Biological and Experimental Psychology, School of Biological and Chemical Sciences, Queen Mary University of London, Mile End Road, London, E1 4NS, UK. j.woodgate@qmul.ac.uk.
James C MakinsonDepartment of Biological and Experimental Psychology, School of Biological and Chemical Sciences, Queen Mary University of London, Mile End Road, London, E1 4NS, UK.
Ka S LimRothamsted Research, West Common, Harpenden, Hertfordshire, AL5 2JQ, UK.ORCID 0000-0002-9166-2928
Andrew M ReynoldsRothamsted Research, West Common, Harpenden, Hertfordshire, AL5 2JQ, UK.
Lars ChittkaDepartment of Biological and Experimental Psychology, School of Biological and Chemical Sciences, Queen Mary University of London, Mile End Road, London, E1 4NS, UK.ORCID 0000-0001-8153-1732

Funding

European Research Council 339347
6 · The paper itself

Abstract

Animals that visit multiple foraging sites face a problem, analogous to the Travelling Salesman Problem, of finding an efficient route. We explored bumblebees' route development on an array of five artificial flowers in which minimising travel distances between individual feeders conflicted with minimising overall distance. No previous study of bee spatial navigation has been able to follow animals' movement during learning; we tracked bumblebee foragers continuously, using harmonic radar, and examined the process of route formation in detail for a small number of selected individuals. On our array, bees did not settle on visit sequences that gave the shortest overall path, but prioritised movements to nearby feeders. Nonetheless, flight distance and duration reduced with experience. This increased efficiency was attributable mainly to experienced bees reducing exploration beyond the feeder array and flights becoming straighter with experience, rather than improvements in the sequence of feeder visits. Flight paths of all legs of a flight stabilised at similar rates, whereas the first few feeder visits became fixed early while bees continued to experiment with the order of later visits. Stabilising early sections of a route and prioritising travel between nearby destinations may reduce the search space, allowing rapid adoption of efficient routes.

Indexed as

Behavior, AnimalFeeding BehaviorAnimalsBeesFlight, AnimalFlowersLearningRadarVideo Recording

Identifiers

PMID29230062
PMCPMC5725577

What OpenQuestion holds

Textmetadata
LicenceCC BY
Read underepoch 390

Registered trials

None linked

Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.