  The motion of social insects is often used a paradigmatic example of complex
adaptive dynamics arising from decentralized individual behavior. In this paper
we revisit the topic of the ruling laws behind burst of activity in ants. The
analysis, done over previously reported data, reconsider the causation arrows,
proposed at individual level, not finding any link between the duration of the
ants' activity and its moving speed. Secondly, synthetic trajectories created
from steps of different ants, demonstrate that a Markov process can explain the
previously reported speed shape profile. Finally we show that as more ants
enter the nest, the faster they move, which implies a collective property.
Overall these results provides a mechanistic explanation for the reported
behavioral laws, and suggest a formal way to further study the collective
properties in these scenarios.
