|
|
Lord of the Ants
|
|
|
|
Program Overview
|
|
|
NOVA profiles Edward O. Wilson, a pioneering biologist whose study
of ants led to the advent of sociobiology, a discipline that seeks
to explain the social behavior of all species through genetics and
natural selection.
The program:
-
reveals how Wilson's love of nature began during his childhood
as he explored the woods in southern Alabama.
explains how he came to study ants. -
notes that Wilson, during the three years he spent collecting
specimens in the tropics, was the same age Charles Darwin was
when he made a similar journey.
-
travels with Wilson to the Dominican Republic, where he searches
for ants of the genus Pheidole, which includes about 20
percent of all known ants in the western hemisphere.
-
reveals detailed characteristics of the Pheidole soldier
ant, the type of ant that is often used to differentiate one
species from another because it offers the most traits for
comparison.
-
reports that Wilson has spent more than two decades compiling
his exhaustive reference work,
Pheidole in the New World: A Dominant Hyperdiverse Ant
Genus.
-
explains how Wilson discovered that ants communicate in a
chemical language by releasing their pheromones.
-
follows Wilson's odyssey from studying the behavior of ants
to trying to make sense of the genetic basis of all animal
behavior—an endeavor that led to the development of the
field of sociobiology.
-
reports on the controversy brought about by Wilson's suggestion
that genes may play a role in the development of human social
behavior.
-
details a 1965 experiment in mass extinction that Wilson and a
colleague conducted on a small island in the Florida Keys.
-
chronicles Wilson's efforts to protect the biodiversity of the
world's forests.
Taping Rights: Can be used up to one year after program is
recorded off the air.
|
|
