Quorum Sensing - Social Insects

Social Insects

Social insect colonies are an excellent example of a decentralized system, because no individual is in charge of directing or making decisions for the colony. Several groups of social insects have been shown to use quorum sensing in a process that resembles collective decision-making.

Read more about this topic:  Quorum Sensing

Famous quotes containing the words social and/or insects:

    Man, became man through work, who stepped out of the animal kingdom as transformer of the natural into the artificial, who became therefore the magician, man the creator of social reality, will always stay the great magician, will always be Prometheus bringing fire from heaven to earth, will always be Orpheus enthralling nature with his music. Not until humanity itself dies will art die.
    Ernst Fischer (1899–1972)

    If the stars that move together as one, disband,
    Flying like insects of fire in a cavern of night,
    Pipperoo, pippera, pipperum . . . The rest is rot.
    Wallace Stevens (1879–1955)