Ants Build Cheapest Networks

schliz writes "When building a network from scratch, Argentine ants tend to connect their nests in the way that, while more inconvenient for individual ants, requires the minimum amount of trail. Researchers studying 'supercolonies' of the ants found them building networks that closely resembled the mathematical shortest path — a Steiner tree. They hope to apply their work to self-healing, organic computing networks of self-organising sensors, robots, computers, and autonomous cars." This story adds to the earlier report of ants' networking prowess.

Comments

Re:skynet

[GNUALMAFUERTE]

Don't worry. This are Argentinian ants. They'll do everything they need to do in order to conquer the world, then just sit there, procrastinate, then make little bars and spend the rest of their life discussing with each other what could have been and why they didn't reach their goal, and how it's somebody else's fault.

[Disclaimer: I'm from Buenos Aires, Argentina]