Task Partitioning in Insect Societies: A Model Based on Electric Circuits
Task Partitioning in Insect Societies: A Model Based on Electric Circuits
This Demonstration uses electronic circuits to model the construction strategies of social wasps. This is an example of a complex biological phenomenon that can be described by equations from physics.
You can change the size of the workforce, the capacity of storage or use of material by manipulating different parts of the circuits.
The main components are: electron (water) flow, electron (water) source and the circuits (groups of wasps that carry out the same task). See Details for the parameters. The line graph represents the group size of the wasps (charge of circuits) that belong to the different task groups: water foragers (blue), common stomach wasps (purple), pulp foragers (dark gold) and builders (green).
All task groups emerge from nonspecialized wasps. First, the water foragers emerge and carry water to the nest; this triggers the emergence of common stomach wasps that store water. The increased water in the colony triggers the emergence of pulp foragers and builders. Finally, the workforce develops an equilibrium that ensures steady construction.