INSPIRE: Asynchronous communication, self-organization, and differentiation in human and insect networks

该INSPIRE奖的部分资金来自社会、行为和经济科学理事会行为和认知科学部的感知、行动和认知项目，生物学理事会综合有机体系统部门的动物行为项目，以及工程理事会土木、机械和制造创新部门的动力系统项目。该项目探讨了个人的活动如何融入一个平稳运作的社会的问题：什么是主导机制？它们的弹性有多大？它们是如何依赖于个体社会成员的属性的？为此，来自工程学、生物学、心理学和语言学的研究人员将共同研究蜂群和人类群体，以了解这些多主体系统是如何产生组织和协调的，以及影响它们对扰动的稳健性和弹性的因素。该项目依赖于对互动和协调模式动态出现的定量观察，使用前所未有的蜂箱24/7监测系统，以及在受控条件下的人群中，旨在区分失败和成功的协调。研究人员将寻求一个结合理论、实验和计算的框架来表征由此产生的并行和异步通信系统。这项工作主要依赖于跨学科的框架和研究人员所代表的学科的内容专业知识的直接参与。例如，人类运输网络的设计类似于通过蜂箱协调输送花蜜，但可以选择不同运输材料的数量、场地的大小、材料的流速等等。研究人员正在探索是否可以发现一个全面的计算框架来理解、预测和防止非常不同类型的社区（蜜蜂和人类网络）的崩溃。研究结果有望为如何操纵复杂系统的行为提供见解，例如，解决与授粉蜂群崩溃或破坏性行为相关的社会挑战，这些行为通常与人类群体的社会过渡阶段有关。

This INSPIRE award is partially funded by the Perception, Action, and Cognition Program in the Division of Behavioral and Cognitive Sciences in the Directorate for Social, Behavioral and Economic Sciences, the Animal Behavior Program in the Division of Integrative Organismal Systems in the Directorate for Biology, and the Dynamical Systems Program in the Division of Civil, Mechanical & Manufacturing Innovation in the Directorate for Engineering.The project explores the question of how the activities of individuals become integrated into a smoothly functioning society: What are the dominant mechanisms? How resilient are they? How do they depend on the properties of individual society members? To this end, investigators from engineering, biology, psychology and linguistics will work together to study bee colonies and groups of humans to understand how organization and coordination emerges from these multi-agent systems and the factors that influence their robustness and resilience to perturbations. The project relies on quantitative observations of the dynamic emergence of patterns of interaction and coordination using an unprecedented, 24/7 monitoring system of a beehive as well as in groups of humans under controlled conditions designed to distinguish between failed and successful coordination. The investigators will pursue a combined theoretical, experimental, and computational framework for characterizing the resultant parallel and asynchronous communication systems. The work depends crucially on the interdisciplinary framework and the direct involvement of content expertise from the disciplines represented by the investigators. For example, the human transportation network is designed to resemble the coordinated delivery of nectar through a beehive, but with options for varying the number of different materials transported, the size of arena, the flow rates of the materials, and so on.The investigators are exploring whether a comprehensive computational framework can be discovered to understand, predict and prevent the collapse of very different types of communities (bees and human networks). The research results are expected to provide insight into how to manipulate the behavior of a complex system, for example to address societal challenges associated with the collapse of pollinating bee colonies or the destructive behavior that is often associated with phases of social transition in groups of humans.