Social Behaviour & Social Evolution
New citizen science project launched August 2017!
We know surprisingly little about social wasps. The Big Wasp Survey harnesses the public’s dislike of social wasps, to get their help in sampling wasp populations across the UK. Check it out here!
Our Research
Social insects like honeybees and army ants are cool, there is no denying it. But how, and why, do they exist at all? Sociality represents a major transition in evolution: understanding the mechanisms and function of social behaviour provides important insights into one of the most fascinating phenomena in the natural world.
Some of the questions we are interested in:
What role do genes have in shaping social evolution and behaviour?
How does behaviour provide environmental resilience to societies?
Do males matter in social insect societies, or are they just flying sperm?
Invasive ants have the power to alter habitats around the world. Is the Formicocene era the new anthropocene?
