03.06.2019: Ph. D. Mohammad PARHIZAR (Graz): Social Amoeba Dictyostelium discoideum as an Inspiration for Higher-Order Emergence in Collective Adaptive Systems and Swarm Robotics, HS 02.11, Institut für Biologie, Bereich für Zoologie, Univ.-Platz 2, 13:15 Uhr.
Collective behavior in nature provides a source of inspiration for engineering artificial systems (e.g., robotics, ecosystems of services), due to their inherent mechanisms favoring adaptation to environmental changes and enabling complex emergent behavior to arise from a relatively simple behavior of individual entities. The first-order emergence also referred to as swarm intelligence, is well studied, while higher-order levels of emergent behavior have not received much attention yet. Second-order emergent behavior arises from the interactions of individuals, which are themselves the result of first-order emergent behavior. Dictyostelium discoideum provides a compelling case for studying both first- and second-order emergence. Individual cells move around on their own when there is plenty of food. When food is scarce, cells self-aggregate towards a leading center cell (first-order emergent behavior) to build a super-organism, similar to a slug. The slug exhibits properties that none of the cells has on its own (e.g., sensitivity to light and heat). This presentation focuses specifically on the aggregation and migration phases of Dictyostelium discoideum. We present two agent-based models first-order and second-order collective behaviors, which display a series of emergent properties, among others: homogeneous aggregation territories size (first-order), merging of slugs or new property as sensitivity to light (second-order). Also, we discuss our simple implementations and preliminary results of both first- and second-order emergence in real swarm robotics, and identification of design patterns for engineering higher-order emergent behavior in artificial systems.