Day 8: Research Wrap-Up

Well if Brad's note wouldn't have been deleted on accident by Ms. Joel as she was posting it :(...it would have said something like this.....

The students worked hard on their experiments all day. This was shown in the dedication of several teams that started their day at 6 am to finish their individual work. This work was very important because each team was asked to give a formal presentation at 5pm this evening. In preparation for such an event students were kept busy throughout the day with assigned group work time, and a practice presentation session. Groups met individually with Dr. Adrian Pinto to preform statistical analysis on their data, create graphs, tables and then drew relevant conclusions. Each groups conclusion is as follows. 

Brad, Quinn, Bri N. and Sam created a phsical barrier for preventing crop destruction. A bamboo mote structure filled with water was created and field tested. This structure after several late night trials was statically proven to stop Atta Cepholates from entering the tested protected area, almost 100% of the time. Practical implications of such a structure would be to lay said structure in the ground around the base of the tree, or building a frame around a garden. They would encourage future study of motes made out of readily available resources such as tires, or PVC piping to test future effectiveness. 

Juilian, Nicky, Matt and Trevor focused on sound emission on Atta reactiveness. They  held a solider ant near a recording device and recorded the audiable vibration noises made for 30 seconds. The group believed that this sound would be a distress signal and should encourage Atta movement. They found that sound did in fact trigger a quicker response movement  toward the sound device than other controls. But after several trials and different variations it was shown that with such unrefined equipment and limited time for trials although Atta did in fact react to the distress call they also would react momentaulary to digitalized sound. Although data was statisitically random this group has in fact laid the ground work for future research in sound emission, and proves that effective results are possible. Future research is to be done using higher resolution recording devices with work in recording different types of ant vibrations, other high frequency noises or possible sounds of the ant's predator. 

Mae, Birch, Nic, and Alyna focused on Atta Cephaolotes control via citronella and detergents placed around leaves. Previous groups had shown that citronella was in fact a deterrent for Atta, but that practicality was an issue due to the short time frame of effectiveness. So the group created a series of trials testing a detergent mixed with citronella to hopefully increase the time of effectiveness. The group found over a 24 hour period  that detergents will in fact increase citronella's effect for a bit longer but still were not effective long term. The group would suggest further study in strength of detergent and citronella mixture, redesigning the experiment to observe the leaves more frequently and also refining the extraction process of the citronella.

Lastly Thomas, Ian, Bri F., and David addressed Atta crop destruction by using Tabasco and the Serigundi plant. Both are known repellants of the Atta species. This group found that Tabasco was not a relaible deterrent both in their lab and field experiments. However when Serigundi plant oil was compared to the neutral water control the group was able to show stastically that Serigundi could be used as an effective and natural deterrent. Further experimental research would focus on strength of Tabasco and Serigundi mixtures.