Ants Build Cheapest Networks 108
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.
Re:Evolution is smarter than you. (Score:4, Informative)
such as Kings leading peasants
A peasant wouldn't be able to put one foot in front of the other (which is what you need for near optimal paths), if it weren't for the divine inspiration provided by his King!
Not a Steiner tree (Score:4, Informative)
The 2nd picture of trails in the article shows trail lengths which are longer than if each nest were directly connected, even if they did add another vertex to the middle.