Ants contribute to carbon sequestration

Ars Technica : The weathering of minerals on Earth’s surface helps regulate its climate over geological time scales. As the minerals break down, they react with carbon dioxide. In warmer regions, the minerals break down more quickly, resulting in more CO₂ being sequestered, which has a cooling effect. In cooler regions, the minerals break down more slowly and less CO₂ is sequestered, which has a warming effect. Other factors are known to contribute to such physical weathering, including the breaking up of rocks and soil by tree roots, lichens and fungi, and burrowing organisms. To try and determine to what degree biology influences the process, Ronald Dorn of Arizona State University conducted a 25-year-long study of the weathering of basalt sand samples placed in a variety of environments, from Arizona to Texas. He put the samples in holes augured into the ground, tree roots, ant nests, and other locations. When he compared the samples, the material in the ant nests showed the most weathering, with 50–175 times that of the baseline sand. How the ants cause such accelerated weathering is unknown, but understanding the chemistry involved might one day help humans in their efforts to reduce atmospheric carbon levels.