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Bees Beat Machines At 'Traveling Salesman' Problem

eldavojohn writes "Recent research on bumble bees has proven that the tiny bee is better than computers at the traveling salesman problem. As bees visit flowers to collect nectar and pollen they discover other flowers en route in the wrong order. But they still manage to quickly learn and fly the optimally shortest path between flowers. Such a problem is NP-Hard and keeps our best machines thinking for days searching for a solution but researchers are quite interested how such a tiny insect can figure it out on the fly — especially given how important this problem is to networks and transportation. A testament to the power of even the smallest batch of neurons or simply evidence our algorithms need work?"

9 of 394 comments (clear)

  1. great... by MagicMerlin · · Score: 5, Funny

    now you get a faster computer that makes honey!

    1. Re:great... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

      No, you get a beeowulf cluster.

  2. Well... by Kufat · · Score: 5, Funny

    Does this mean that B >= NP?

  3. Re:Evidence by tverbeek · · Score: 5, Funny

    It's an abbreviation for Good Old Darwinism.

    --
    http://alternatives.rzero.com/
  4. Re:I doubt it by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    Hulk smash traveling salesman!

    (I assuming we can engineer Hulks.)

  5. Re:Entomoengineering? by $RANDOMLUSER · · Score: 5, Funny

    Many researchers are worried that the baculovirus isn't as benign as first thought. Some even claim it killed the Star Trek franchise.

    --
    No folly is more costly than the folly of intolerant idealism. - Winston Churchill
  6. Re:Wait, whut? by fractoid · · Score: 5, Funny

    Oh, beehave.

    --
    Rampant carbon sequestration destroyed the Dinosaurs' tropical paradise. I'm here to help repair the damage.
  7. Re:Shortcuts by MaskedSlacker · · Score: 5, Funny

    I dunno. If only we had a word for this....something like the line that a bee would travel...

  8. Re:Heuristic by ubersoldat2k7 · · Score: 5, Funny

    It's called Ruby, and it's not a problem, it's a feature, a trendy one.