Suitable light regimes for filming termites in laboratory bioassays

Laboratory assays using animals require strategies to avoid stress and keep animals alive as long as the test demands. Termites live in a constant dark environment in their nests, but in studies that demand video recording, termites are exposed to light. Since light is a condition opposed to what termites naturally live, it is possible that this condition might stress termites. To find how suitable are lights in video recording termites, we evaluated the effect of infrared lights and cold white light in the survival of workers of \textit{Cornitermes cumulans} (Termitidae: Syntermitinae) confined in Petri dishes. We compared the survival of termites in the light treatments and termites kept in the dark. As our null hypothesis, time until death would not differ between termites exposed to cold white lights, infrared lights, and termites kept in the dark. We found that the survival of \textit{C. cumulans} workers was not affected by light since there was no statistical difference in the mortality between the three treatments. Here we show that both infrared lights and cold white lights can be used in lab assays to video record termites, as such lights did not affect workers survival.