Bumblebees navigate new turf without a map

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Bumblebees don’t need a map to know where they’re going. A large-scale experiment that outfitted the insects with radar antennas (shown) revealed that bumblebees are adept at figuring out the optimal route among several flowers, a tough computational problem. Credit: Andrew Martin

Bumblebees are anything but bumbling: The insects quickly figure out the optimal route for visiting five far-flung flowers, a computational task that even human brains find challenging.

That result suggests that an elaborate mental map isn’t necessary to travel efficiently in unknown territory. Finding a way to mimic the bumblebee’s navigation system may allow programmers to develop robots that adeptly maneuver through unfamiliar places.

The new study, published online September 20 in PLOS Biology, pulls together several lines of previous research into one grand experiment. After training bumblebees to associate artificial flowers with a reward, scientists from the University of Sydney, Rothamsted Research in Harpenden, England and Queen Mary University of London arranged five flowers in a pentagon with sides 50 meters long. One at a time, bumblebees outfitted with a little radar antenna were released from the hive. The bees’ movements were tracked by radar, and motion-sensing cameras on the flowers recorded each visiting bee.