The following outline is provided as an overview of and topical guide to ants:
Ants – social insects with geniculate (elbowed) antennae and a distinctive node-like structure that forms a slender waist. Ants are of the family Formicidae and evolved from wasp-like ancestors in the mid-Cretaceous period between 110 and 130 million years ago, diversifying after the rise of flowering plants. More than 12,500 out of an estimated total of 22,000 species have been classified.
Essence of ants
Ant colony
Myrmecology – scientific study of ants
Biological classification
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Arthropoda
Class: Insecta
Order: Hymenoptera
Suborder: Apocrita
Superfamily: Vespoidea
Family: Formicidae (family authority: Latreille, 1809)
Kinds of ants
Ant
List of ant genera
List of ants of Great Britain
Subfamilies
Extant subfamilies
Agroecomyrmecinae
Amblyoponinae
Aneuretinae
Dolichoderinae
Dorylinae
Ectatomminae
Formicinae
Heteroponerinae
Leptanillinae
Martialinae
Myrmeciinae
Myrmicinae
Paraponerinae
Ponerinae
Proceratiinae
Pseudomyrmecinae
Fossil subfamilies
†Armaniinae (sometimes treated as the family Armaniidae within the superfamily Formicoidea) †Brownimeciinae †Formiciinae †Sphecomyrminae
General myrmecology concepts
Myrmecologists
Murray S. Blum (1929–2015) Barry Bolton Horace Donisthorpe (1870–1951) Auguste Forel (1848–1931) William Gould (1715–1799) Bert Hölldobler (born 1936) Thomas C. Jerdon (1811–1872) Sir John Lubbock (1st Lord and Baron Avebury) (1834–1913) Derek Wragge Morley (1920–1969) Frederick Smith (1805–1879) John Obadiah Westwood (1805–1893) William Morton Wheeler (1865–1937) E.O. Wilson (1929–2021)