Great discoveries lie at the edge of chaos, and nature provides perhaps the best inspiration for finding order in anarchy. Fish school, birds flock, fireflies sync听and ants colonize. This type of collective behavior that forms complex and听adaptive systems is what scientists refer to as emergence.
Studying emergent behavior has long fascinated engineers, and researchers at the University of Colorado Boulder have uncovered a distinct behavior in colonies of fire ants cooperating in flood situations. PhD candidates Robert Wagner, Kristen Such, Ethan Hobbs and Professor Franck Vernerey听studied how the ants spontaneously form听tether-like protrusions that help them navigate and听escape flooded environments.
They found the dynamic shape that the fire ants take on is听sustained by听competing mechanisms of structural contraction and outward expansion. The researchers hope their work will inspire future studies听by听providing听swarm roboticists and engineers with ant-inspired rules that could help achieve complex functional tasks.
Their research听was recently published in the听听鈥� titled "Treadmilling and dynamic protrusions in fire ant rafts."听Check out the video below听to watch how the听ants听form their own interconnected, floating raft.
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