Cataglyphis is a genus of ant, desert ants, in the subfamily Formicinae. Its most famous species is C. bicolor, the Sahara Desert ant, which runs on hot sand to find insects that died of heat exhaustion, and can, like other several other Cataglyphis species, sustain body temperatures up to 50°C. Cataglyphis is also the name of an autonomous rover that won the NASA Sample Return Robot Centennial Challenge inspired by the navigation approaches used by desert ants.
Name It was named in 1850, with reference to the impressions of its abdomen: "Von χατά und γλυψίς der Einschnitt. Eine Andeutung auf die vielen Einschnitte oder vielmehr Eindrücke de Hinterleibs."Foerster, A. 1850b. Eine Centurie neuer Hymenopteren. Zweite Dekade. Verh. Naturhist. Ver. Preuss. Rheinl. Westfal. 7: 485-500 (page 493)
Description Species of this genus are behaviourally, morphologically, and physiologically adapted to dry and hot habitats.
Navigational behaviour In the Sahara, ants live where no bushes or clumps of grass are available to protect them, and where tracks are covered by wind-blown sand in seconds. The midday sun is so hot that even the permanent residents, sand lizards, insects, and a few birds, have to take shelter, but this is when, for not much more than an hour, Cataglyphis spp. are to come out of their underground nests and forage. They can withstand higher temperatures than any other insects. They pour out on to the sand and search for insects that have died of heat stress. Each ant dashes about in zigzag patterns, but as soon as one is lucky enough to find a tiny insect corpse, it has to get it back to the nest quickly before the ant dies of the heat. It does not retrace the zig-zagging path of its outward journey; even if a scent trail made this possible, such a route would be time-wasting. Instead, it runs in a straight line directly back to its nest hole.
On its outward journey, it zig-zags right and left. Every time it changes direction, it lifts its head and wheels around to take a bearing on the sun. In addition, it has to remember how far it went on each straight run. When time to head for home, it has to sum all these data and come out with the precise direction needed. Some outward journeys take an ant a quarter of an hour, with sun sightings every few seconds.
In an experiment, individual ants were fitted with an apparatus that blocked direct sight of the sun, while giving a false impression of where the sun was, using a mirror. When these ants headed for home, they dashed off to a point in the desert displaced by just the amount that the mirror had shifted the sun's position.
Like ants in the Crematogaster genus, Cataglyphis workers can raise their gaster (abdomen) to a vertical position in an acrobat manner. This behavior may serve as a defensive gesture in Crematogaster (acrobat) ants, but in Cataglyphis this is thought to improve mobility in desert habitats.
Distribution At least five different species of Cataglyphis occur in the Sahara Desert, which may be considered the center of distribution for this genus. Five species also occur in Israel. Some species reach into southern Russia, southern Spain, Greece, the former Yugoslavia, Hungary, the European part of Turkey, and the Aral-Caspian area near Tijanchan.
Parthenogenesis Queen ants of the species C. cursor can produce female reproductive progeny (i.e. potential new queens or gynes) by parthenogenesis. Parthenogenesis, in this case, involves, a process (automictic thelytoky) by which two haploid products of meiosis fuse to form a diploid zygote that develops into a gyne. Queens can also produce female worker ants by sexual reproduction involving fertilisation of eggs.
Species Extant
Cataglyphis abudawoodi Sharaf, 2026 Cataglyphis abyssinica (Forel, 1904) Cataglyphis acutinodis Collingwood & Agosti, 1996 Cataglyphis adenensis (Forel, 1904) Cataglyphis aenescens (Nylander, 1849) Cataglyphis agostii Sharaf, 2007 Cataglyphis albicans (Roger, 1859) Cataglyphis alibabae Pisarski, 1965 Cataglyphis altisquamis (André, 1881) Cataglyphis aphrodite Salata et al., 2023 Cataglyphis arenaria Finzi, 1940 Cataglyphis argentata (Radoszkowsky, 1876) Cataglyphis asiriensis Collingwood, 1985 Cataglyphis aurata Menozzi, 1932 Cataglyphis bazoftensis Khalili-Moghadam et al., 2021 Cataglyphis bellicosa (Karavaiev, 1924) Cataglyphis bergiana Arnol'di, 1964 Cataglyphis bicolor (Fabricius, 1793) Cataglyphis bombycina (Roger, 1859) Cataglyphis bucharica Emery, 1925 Cataglyphis cana Santschi, 1925 Cataglyphis chionistrae Salata et al., 2023 Cataglyphis cinnamomea (Karavaiev, 1910) Cataglyphis convexus Oueslati et al., 2023 Cataglyphis cretica (Forel, 1910) Cataglyphis cubica (Forel, 1903) Cataglyphis cugiai Menozzi, 1939 Cataglyphis cuneinodis Arnol'di, 1964 Cataglyphis cursor (Fonscolombe, 1846) Cataglyphis dejdaranensis Khalili-Moghadam et al., 2021 Cataglyphis diehlii (Forel, 1902) Cataglyphis douwesi De Haro & Collingwood, 2000 Cataglyphis elegantissima Arnol'di, 1968 Cataglyphis emeryi (Karavaiev, 1911) Cataglyphis emmae (Forel, 1909) Cataglyphis espadaleri Cagniant, 2009 Cataglyphis fici Salata et al., 2021 Cataglyphis fisheri Sharaf & Aldawood, 2015 Cataglyphis flavitibia Chang & He, 2002 Cataglyphis flavobrunnea Collingwood & Agosti, 1996 Cataglyphis floricola Tinaut, 1993 Cataglyphis foreli (Ruzsky, 1903) Cataglyphis fortis (Forel, 1902) Cataglyphis fossilis Cagniant, 2009 Cataglyphis frigida (André, 1881) Cataglyphis fritillariae Khalili-Moghadam et al., 2021 Cataglyphis gadeai De Haro & Collingwood, 2003 Cataglyphis gaetula Santschi, 1929 Cataglyphis glabilabia Chang & He, 2002 Cataglyphis golestanica Salata et al., 2025 Cataglyphis gracilens Santschi, 1929 Cataglyphis hannae Agosti, 1994 Cataglyphis harteni Collingwood & Agosti, 1996 Cataglyphis helanensis Chang & He, 2002 Cataglyphis hellenica (Forel, 1886) Cataglyphis hispanica (Emery, 1906) Cataglyphis holgerseni Collingwood & Agosti, 1996 Cataglyphis humeya Tinaut, 1991 Cataglyphis iberica (Emery, 1906) Cataglyphis indica Pisarski, 1962 Cataglyphis isis (Forel, 1913) Cataglyphis israelensis Ionescu & Eyer, 2016 Cataglyphis italica (Emery, 1906) Cataglyphis kurdistanica Pisarski, 1965 Cataglyphis laevior Santschi, 1929 Cataglyphis lirabiensis Khalili-Moghadam et al., 2023 Cataglyphis livida (André, 1881) Cataglyphis lunatica Baroni Urbani, 1969 Cataglyphis lutea Weber, 1952 Cataglyphis machmal Radchenko & Arakelian, 1991 Cataglyphis marroui Cagniant, 2009 Cataglyphis mauritanica (Emery, 1906) Cataglyphis minima Collingwood, 1985 Cataglyphis minos Borowiec & Salata, 2022 Cataglyphis nigra (André, 1881) Cataglyphis nigripes Arnol'di, 1964 Cataglyphis nodus (Brullé, 1833) Cataglyphis oasium Menozzi, 1932 Cataglyphis opacior Collingwood & Agosti, 1996 Cataglyphis otini Santschi, 1929 Cataglyphis oxiana Arnol'di, 1964 Cataglyphis pallida Mayr, 1877 Cataglyphis piligera Arnol'di, 1964 Cataglyphis piliscapa (Forel, 1901) Cataglyphis pilisquamis Santschi, 1929 Cataglyphis pubescens Radchenko & Paknia, 2010 Cataglyphis rosenhaueri Santschi, 1925 Cataglyphis rubra (Forel, 1903) Cataglyphis sabulosa Kugler, 1981 Cataglyphis saharae Santschi, 1929 Cataglyphis savignyi (Dufour, 1862) Cataglyphis semitonsa Santschi, 1929 Cataglyphis setipes (Forel, 1894) Cataglyphis shahrekordensis Khalili-Moghadam et al., 2023 Cataglyphis shuaibensis Collingwood & Agosti, 1996 Cataglyphis stigmata Radchenko & Paknia, 2010 Cataglyphis takyrica Dlussky, 1990 Cataglyphis tartessica Amor & Ortega, 2014 Cataglyphis theryi Santschi, 1921 Cataglyphis urens Collingwood, 1985 Cataglyphis vaucheri (Emery, 1906) Cataglyphis velox Santschi, 1929 Cataglyphis viatica (Fabricius, 1787) Cataglyphis viaticoides (André, 1881) Cataglyphis zakharovi Radchenko, 1997
Unidentifiable A number of species tentatively placed within the genus have subsequently been determined as unidentifiable to the species level, although they technically remain valid binomen. Cataglyphis bicoloripes Walker, 1871 Cataglyphis longipedem (Eichwald, 1841)
References
Further reading Heusser, Daniel & Wehner, Rüdiger (2002): The visual centring response in desert ants, Cataglyphis fortis. The Journal of Experimental Biology 205: 585–590. Full HTML - PDF
External links
YouTube: Video of Cataglyphis catching prey in the Sahara desert