Mathematical models for some types of chemical information systems (Q1112769)

Ant species on a ``high evolutionary level'' have evolved chemical recruitment systems such as mass recruitment or quality recruitment. The recruitment process from the nest to a food source may be damped by crowding effects at the source. The authors study mathematical models for the time development of the quantity of food at the source. Each model can be reduced to a second order time-delayed differential equation which is studied in the equivalent form of a first order nonlinear functional differential equation. The authors discuss the complete exploitation of a given source. They prove that for the damped models the ``capacity'' of the crowded source must be large compared with the initial quantity of food offered.