Scientists made world first mutant ants with gene editing technology

It may sound like a script for a science fiction movie, but scientists have created the world’s first mutant ants.

Two independent research teams have harnessed the gene editing technology CRISPR to genetically alter the ants. In one study, researchers at Rockefeller University modified a gene essential for sensing the pheromones that ants use to communicate. Experts say that the resulting deficiencies in the ants’ social behaviors and their ability to survive in a colony, sheds light on social evolution.

“It was well known that ant language is produced through pheromones, but now we understand a lot more about how pheromones are perceived,” said Daniel Kronauer, head of Rockefeller University’s Laboratory of Social Evolution and Behavior, in a statement. “The way ants interact is fundamentally different from how solitary organisms interact, and with these findings we know a bit more about the genetic evolution that enabled ants to create structured societies.”

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CRISPR, which has been compared to a pair of “molecular scissors,” lets scientists alter or replace specific sections of DNA.

Scientists used CRISPR to disrupt a gene known as Orco in the clonal raider ant, species Ooceraea biroi, but then faced the challenge of keeping the mutant ants alive. “We had to convince the colonies to accept the mutants. If the conditions weren’t right, the worker ants would stop caring for larvae and destroy them,” said Rockefeller University graduate fellow Waring Trible, in the statement. “Once the ants successfully made it to the adult phase, we noticed a shift in their behavior almost immediately.”

While ants typically travel single file, researchers noticed that the mutant ants couldn’t fall in line, along with other behavioral abnormalities.