India, March 6 -- Radhika Krishnaswamy, Senior Vice President, Findability Sciences

Recently, I was watching a documentary with my children about leafcutter ant colonies when my ears perked up as the narrator described the ants as 'farmers'. Leafcutter ants harvest leaves they do not eat directly. Instead, they cultivate the leaves into fungus, which becomes their primary food source. Different ants specialize in different roles, with physical characteristics adapted to the tasks they perform.

I had been thinking about the global food system for this article, and given a subject area of this magnitude where outcomes are driven by more than individual participants' actions, the leafcutter ant colony mechanisms proved thought provoking. T...