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zombie are among us . And these lilliputian undead creatures are everywhere . In this excerption from " Rise of the Zombie Bugs"(Johns Hopkins University Press , 2025 ) , author Mindy Weisberger probe the very grisly end for worker ants that get zombiefied by the behead flyPseudacteon wasmanni .
Scientists first described the gruesome habits of ant decapitators in the phorid genusPseudacteonmore than 90 years ago , from observations among ant population in Europe , South America , and the United States . A distaff fly begin by hazard out a worker ant — cautiously keeping her space at first , as she is no big than her objective ’s head .
Decapitator flies lay their larvae inside the ant’s thorax. The ant then has just a few weeks to live before its eaten from the inside out.
To scientist keep phorids in the landing field , " they seem as minute , fuzzed jot as they vacillate over host ants,“Lloyd Morrison , an ecologist for the National Park Service , wrote in a guide to insect parasitoids in North America .
Females do n’t have a peck of time to be choosy about their hosts , as adult fly live only for about a hebdomad or less in the wild . When the female fly find out an possible action , she darts in and place an ballock inside the pismire ’s thorax — one and done — in less than a second ( analysis of the distaff reproductive system in the phorid flyPseudacteon wasmannirevealed that eggs are torpedo - shaped and measure 130 micrometers long , or about 0.005 in ) .
A singlePseudacteonfemale can produce from 200 to nearly 300 eggs , and in a single 60 minutes she may make more than 100 parasitizing try ( though she only lay one egg per host ) .
A phorid fly (left),Pseudacteon cultellatus,about 1 mm long, and a red imported fire ant (right),Solenopsis invicta,about 3 mm long. The fly can lay eggs inside the ant’s head. Fly maggots that hatch will then slowly decapitate the ant.
Newly parasitized workers " frequently seem KO’d after an oviposition strike , " U.S. Department of Agriculture entomologistSanford Porterwrote in Florida Entomologist , and the ants " often stilt upon their legs for a few second to a minute before running away . "
These egg - laying attempts do n’t all win ; indeed most of them fizzle . In laboratory experiments , whenPseudacteonfemales seek to implant an egg in an unwilling ant , they break at least 65 % of the metre . But when an egg does manage to end up inside an pismire , its host enters the realm of the walking dead . Once the ball hatching , the ant has only a few weeks of sprightliness before it yield to the manipulation of its attacker , stumble away from its home and family and then undergoing decapitation from the interior out .
Within days after hatching , the phorid larva transmigrate from the thorax into the emmet ’s pass ; niggling is known about how the parasitoid avoids being destroyed by the ant ’s immune system , but one theory is that moving quickly into the host ’s head may help the larva evade an resistant reply . For the duration of the larva ’s second instar — about two to three weeks — it bring in itself comfortable in the ant ’s fountainhead caries , sipping on hemolymph .
A newly hatched decapitator fly bursts from the head of a fire ant that it parasitized and killed.
This fluid nutrition is all the larva call for until it reaches its third instar . For an septic ant during those initial honeymoon hebdomad , despite carry and nourishing a produce sponger inside its head word , life history is pretty much business as usual ; the ant looks and behaves normally , accord to scientists with the Louisiana State University ( LSU ) College of Agriculture .
Through " intensive observance " of ant parasitism by the phorid flyPseudacteon tricuspis , LSU researchers found that a parasitized ant stayed with its nest mates until about 8 to 10 hours before the larva in its oral sex was ready to pupate . It would then depart the nest on what appeared to be a normal forage sashay , alongside its non - parasitized sisters . But for the zombified emmet , this final digression was a one - way misstep .
Once the pismire turned its back on the colony and walked away , it was on a destruction border district . And the parasite was in the driver ’s seat . " Parasitized ant were highly fluid after they left the nest and at long last enrol the thatch layer at the soil surface , " the scientists account . " The terminal figure ' zombi ' fire ant workers was coin to characterize the behavior while under parasitoid control . "
Finally , the phorid larva is quick for its metabolism . It releases an enzyme that cheapen membranes in the wandering emmet ’s exoskeleton , causing the pismire to finish walking and eventually break up . The ant ’s promontory loosens from the organic structure , as does the first pair of legs ; other peg may be sham , too . Its mandibles weaken , rendering it unable to sting or burrow . As for the larva , it cocker a new appetite for solid food ; namely , ant head tissue paper . you may probably guess where this is direct ; the pismire ’s hollow - out , larvae - stuffed header falls off ( the ant , unsurprisingly , is already drained by now , even though its legs are often still twitching as its head rolls away ) .
The parasitoid , however , is just fine . It finishes off the last of the tasty bits inside the decapitate ant promontory and pushes the lower jaw out of the way — the ant ’s no longer using them , after all — and then the larva wriggles into position so that its first three pupal section are stuffed into the gap where the ant ’s mouthparts used to be .
These segment season and darken , becoming a rugged , protective scale that ’s roughly the same color as the ant ’s exoskeleton , and two hairlike breathing " French horn " extend from the pupa out on either side of the ant ’s mouth opening . Other parasitoid insects keep their zombie host awake until the larva ’s metamorphosis is over , but phorids pupate unguarded inside their dead hosts ' disembodied heads .
However , the exoskeleton of an ant ’s head is extremely hard — tougher than other parts of its eubstance — and therefore lend extra protection to the pupating larva , Brown say . Two to six weeks later , depend on air temperature and mintage sizing , the adult phorid tent-fly is ready to pop out from inside the detach ant head , like the goddess Athena of legend springing in full grown from the headway of her father , Zeus .
Only , this newborn is a lot smaller than an ancient Greek deity and has more legs than most . A few hour after emerging , the grownup phorid fly is ready to copulate — and continue its chief - split reproductive cycle .
take out fromRise of the Zombie Bugs : The Surprising Science of Parasitic Mind - Controlby Mindy Weisberger . right of first publication 2025 . publish with permit of Johns Hopkins University Press
Rise of the Zombie Bugs : The Surprising Science of Parasitic Mind - Control Kindle Edition — $ 28.45 on Amazon
Zombies are n’t just the hooey of nightmare . research the fascinating world of actual - life insect zombification .
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