Events: detail
Joint Queen Mary/Imperial College Theory Seminar: Bees and the travelling salesman problem: how tiny brains solve complex cognitive tasks
- Hosted by:
- Queen Mary/Imperial College Logic and Semantics Group
- Speaker:
-
Steven Le Comber, QMUL, Biology Department
- Starts:
- September 12, 2007 at 04:30 pm
- Ends:
- September 12, 2007 at 05:30 pm
- Location:
- Queen Mary, University of London, Department of Computer Science, CS/446, Mile End Road, London, E1 4NS United Kingdom
- Maps:
Description
The Travelling Salesman Problem (TSP) is a computationally complex mathematical problem. Finding the optimal TSP solution can take a supercomputer days or even weeks. However, in some simple form, foraging bees solve travelling salesman problems every day. They link flower visits at multiple locations in ways that minimise the search times and/ or distances flown. How do bees solve these highly complex routing problems without computer assistance? With a brain containing only 1 million neurons, what cognitive ‘short-cuts’ do they employ which allow them to find functional, though not necessarily optimal, solutions?
- Registration required:
- No
- Free:
- Yes
For more information
- Contact person:
- Paulo Oliva
- Email:
- pbo [ at ] dcs.qmul.ac.uk
- Website:
- Joint Queen Mary/Imperial College Theory Seminar: Bees and the travelling salesman problem: how tiny brains solve complex cognitive tasks
