Researchers: Jerome Buhl, Iain Couzin, Audrey Dussutour, Joe Hale,
Steve Simpson , Greg Sword and David Sumpter


This research aims to untangle and make sense of the web of intricate communications between animals that live in groups: to understand their collective organisation. Some of the groups we study, such as ant and human societies, are highly co-operative while others, such as swarms of locusts, are driven by a shared, but selfish desire for food or shelter. How do societies make informed, unanimous decisions? How do fish schools move in unison? How does group behaviour produce population dynamics? How does information flow between individuals in a complex, ever changing environment? We try to answer these questions through a combination of laboratory and field experiments, automated computer vision, computer simulations and mathematical models.
 


Key Publications:

Dussutour, A. and Simpson, S.J. (2008). Carbohydrate regulation in relation to colony growth in ants. Journal of Experimental Biology (in press, April 2008).

Bazazi, S., Buhl, J., Hale, J. J., Anstey, M. L., Sword, G. A., Simpson, S. J. and Couzin, I. D. (2008). Collective motion and cannibalism in locust migratory bands. Current Biology, 18, 1-5.

Dussutour, A., Simpson, S.J., Despland, E. and Colasurdo, N. (2007). When the group denies the individual. Animal Behaviour 74, 931-939.

Buhl, J., Sumpter, D.J.T., Couzin, I.C., Hale, J., Despland, E., Miller, E. and Simpson, S.J. (2006). From disorder to order in marching locusts. Science, 312, 1402-1406.

Despland, E. and Simpson, S.J. (2006). Resource distribution mediates synchronization of physiological rhythms in locust groups. Proceedings of the Royal Society of London, Series B. 273, 1517-1522.

Simpson, S.J., Sword, G.A., Lorch, P.D. and Couzin, I.D. (2006). Cannibal crickets on a forced march for protein and salt. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, U.S.A. 103, 4152-4156.

Couzin, I.D., Krause, J., Franks, N.R. and Levin, S.A. (2005). Effective leadership and decision-making in animal groups on the move. Nature 434, 513-516.

Buhl J., Gautrais J., Solé R.V., Kuntz P., Valverde S., Deneubourg J.L. and Theraulaz G. (2004). Efficiency and robustness in ant networks of galleries. European Physical Journal B, 42, 123-129.

Buhl J., Gautrais J., Deneubourg J.L. and Theraulaz G. (2004). Nest excavation in ants: group size effects on the size and structure of tunneling networks. Naturwissenschaften 92, 602-606.