b'David Hughes leans back in his office in a standard-issue professorship chair as Penn State students in a plaza behind him shuffle toward classes. Between us on his desk\\u2014on either side of a paper cup of black coffee\\u2014are two trays of dead ants stuck through with pins. Some cling to leaves, others curl up around sticks, frozen in their tiny death postures like the now-fossilized humans who couldn\\u2019t escape Pompeii. All, though, have strange structures erupting out of their corpses.\\nLearn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices'