Go to the ant thou sluggard; consider her ways, and be wise: First explorations of a computational model of polymorphic ant caste ratio adaptation through environmental stimuli

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2008-01-21
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en
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Swarm intelligence is the appearance of intelligent behaviour of a collective, which consists of relatively simple agents. Ants appear to utilize a mechanism similar to swarm intelligence as individual input from single ants is responsible for an adequate response by the colony as a whole. Worker to soldier ratio changes within an ant colony are an example of this type of swarm intelligence. The literature yielded two environmental factors which may contribute to a ratio change in ant colonies in the literature, namely food presentation and the detected presence of ants from another colony. In this paper we simulate ant colonies in different situations and environments through a mechanism based on swarm intelligence. We have tested our model in three separate condition sets, namely adaptation of the colony ratio through food presentation alone, through detected enemy presence alone and through a combination of both. Our results indicate that in our model only adaptation on the basis of a combination of the two factors leads to an improvement of the competitiveness of the colony as opposed to a colony with a fixed ratio.
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Faculteit der Sociale Wetenschappen