Phase Transition in Ant Colonies
Institute Professor Maurizio Porfiri and colleagues built a simulation showing that a colony-wide burst of ant activity can be modeled as a phase transition, with the model's predictions closely matching previously published measurements of real ant colonies. Outside expert Guy Theraulaz of the University of Toulouse called the work notable for combining three factors that "had often been treated separately": ant movement, activation by proximity to active nestmates, and transitions between behavioral states.
