Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, University of Connecticut, Storrs, CT 06269-3043, USA.
Proc Biol Sci. 2022 May 25;289(1975):20220343. doi: 10.1098/rspb.2022.0343. Epub 2022 May 18.
Lanchester's models of combat have been invoked to explain the mechanics of group fighting in social animals. Specifically, Lanchester's square law posits that the fighting ability of the group is proportional to the square of the number of combatants. Although used to explain a variety of ecological phenomena, the models have not been thoroughly tested. We tested the Lanchester models using group battles between colonies of the termite . Our main goals were to determine if mortality rates fit the Lanchester models, and if so, whether the behavioural mechanisms underlying a group's success match those used in deriving the model. We initiated battles between pairs of colonies with different ratios of fighters and recorded deaths over time. We found that the numerically larger army has an advantage, but that the advantage is not as pronounced as predicted by Lanchester's square law. We also video-recorded battles to analyse individual behaviour, which did not support the mechanisms invoked by Lanchester. Instead, the killing power of an individual is increased by the presence of nest-mates, giving the larger group a disproportionate advantage. Although the behavioural mechanisms leading to the advantage may differ, our results still support some of the proposed ecological phenomena.
兰彻斯特的战斗模型被用来解释群居动物的群体战斗机制。具体来说，兰彻斯特的平方律假设群体的战斗能力与参战者数量的平方成正比。尽管这些模型被用于解释各种生态现象，但尚未得到彻底验证。我们使用白蚁的殖民地之间的群体战斗来测试兰彻斯特模型。我们的主要目标是确定死亡率是否符合兰彻斯特模型，如果是，那么群体成功的行为机制是否与推导模型所使用的机制相匹配。我们发起了具有不同战斗人员比例的成对殖民地之间的战斗，并记录了随时间的死亡人数。我们发现，数量较大的军队具有优势，但优势并不像兰彻斯特平方律所预测的那样明显。我们还录制了战斗视频来分析个体行为，但这并不支持兰彻斯特所提出的机制。相反，个体的杀伤力会因巢伴的存在而增加，从而使较大的群体获得不成比例的优势。尽管导致优势的行为机制可能不同，但我们的结果仍然支持一些提出的生态现象。
