Termites

Termites preview image

2 collaborators

Uri_dolphin3 Uri Wilensky (Author)
79107734_n00-1 Seth Tisue (Author)

Tags

biology 

Tagged by Reuven M. Lerner over 11 years ago

Model group CCL | Visible to everyone | Changeable by group members (CCL)
Model was written in NetLogo 5.0.4 • Viewed 648 times • Downloaded 88 times • Run 2 times
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WHAT IS IT?

This project is inspired by the behavior of termites gathering wood chips into piles. The termites follow a set of simple rules. Each termite starts wandering randomly. If it bumps into a wood chip, it picks the chip up, and continues to wander randomly. When it bumps into another wood chip, it finds a nearby empty space and puts its wood chip down. With these simple rules, the wood chips eventually end up in a single pile.

HOW TO USE IT

Click the SETUP button to set up the termites (white) and wood chips (yellow). Click the GO button to start the simulation. The termites turn orange when they are carrying a wood chip.

The NUMBER slider controls the number of termites. (Note: Changes in the NUMBER slider do not take effect until the next setup.) The DENSITY slider controls the initial density of wood chips.

THINGS TO NOTICE

As piles of wood chips begin to form, the piles are not "protected" in any way. That is, termites sometimes take chips away from existing piles. That strategy might seem counter-productive. But if the piles were "protected", you would end up with lots of little piles, not one big one.

The final piles are roughly round. Why is this? What other physical situations also produce round things?

In general, the number of piles decreases with time. Why? Some piles disappear, when termites carry away all of the chips. And there is no way to start a new pile from scratch, since termites always put their wood chips near other wood chips. So the number of piles must decrease over time. (The only way a "new" pile starts is when an existing pile splits into two.)

This project is a good example of a "decentralized" strategy. There is no termite in charge, and no special pre-designated site for the piles. Each termite follows a set of simple rules, but the colony as a whole accomplishes a rather sophisticated task.

THINGS TO TRY

Do the results change if you use just a single termite? What if you use several thousand termites?

When there are just two piles left, which of them is most likely to "win" as the single, final pile? How often does the larger of the two piles win? If one pile has only a single wood chip, and the other pile has the rest of the wood chips, what are the chances that the first pile will win?

EXTENDING THE MODEL

Can you extend the model to have the termites sort several colors of wood?

Plot the number of piles, or their average size, or the number of termites carrying wood chips, as the model runs.

NETLOGO FEATURES

Notice that the wood chips do not exist as objects. They are just represented as colors in the patches. The termites update the patch colors as they pick up and put down the wood chips. In effect, the patches are being used as the data structure. This strategy is useful in many NetLogo programs.

Note than when you stop the GO forever button, the termites keep moving for a little while. This is because they are each finishing the commands in the GO procedure. To do this, they must finish their current cycle of finding a chip, finding a pile, and then finding an empty spot near the pile. In most models, the GO function only moves the model forward one step, but in this model, the GO function is written to advance the turtles through a full cycle of activity. See the "Buttons" section of the Programming Guide in the User Manual for more information on turtle forever buttons.

RELATED MODELS

  • Painted Desert Challenge
  • Shepherds
  • State Machine Example

HOW TO CITE

If you mention this model in a publication, we ask that you include these citations for the model itself and for the NetLogo software:

  • Wilensky, U. (1997). NetLogo Termites model. http://ccl.northwestern.edu/netlogo/models/Termites. Center for Connected Learning and Computer-Based Modeling, Northwestern Institute on Complex Systems, Northwestern University, Evanston, IL.
  • Wilensky, U. (1999). NetLogo. http://ccl.northwestern.edu/netlogo/. Center for Connected Learning and Computer-Based Modeling, Northwestern Institute on Complex Systems, Northwestern University, Evanston, IL.

COPYRIGHT AND LICENSE

Copyright 1997 Uri Wilensky.

CC BY-NC-SA 3.0

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 License. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/3.0/ or send a letter to Creative Commons, 559 Nathan Abbott Way, Stanford, California 94305, USA.

Commercial licenses are also available. To inquire about commercial licenses, please contact Uri Wilensky at uri@northwestern.edu.

This model was created as part of the project: CONNECTED MATHEMATICS: MAKING SENSE OF COMPLEX PHENOMENA THROUGH BUILDING OBJECT-BASED PARALLEL MODELS (OBPML). The project gratefully acknowledges the support of the National Science Foundation (Applications of Advanced Technologies Program) -- grant numbers RED #9552950 and REC #9632612.

This model was developed at the MIT Media Lab using CM StarLogo. See Resnick, M. (1994) "Turtles, Termites and Traffic Jams: Explorations in Massively Parallel Microworlds." Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Adapted to StarLogoT, 1997, as part of the Connected Mathematics Project.

This model was converted to NetLogo as part of the projects: PARTICIPATORY SIMULATIONS: NETWORK-BASED DESIGN FOR SYSTEMS LEARNING IN CLASSROOMS and/or INTEGRATED SIMULATION AND MODELING ENVIRONMENT. The project gratefully acknowledges the support of the National Science Foundation (REPP & ROLE programs) -- grant numbers REC #9814682 and REC-0126227. Converted from StarLogoT to NetLogo, 2001.

Comments and Questions

Similarities and differences between Termites and Virus models (Question)

Hi, I am looking at the different types of Agent-based models and I am interested in the similarities and differences between the Termite model and the Virus model. Any responses would be greatly received, Thanks

Posted almost 10 years ago

Click to Run Model

to setup
  clear-all
  set-default-shape turtles "bug"
  ;; randomly distribute wood chips
  ask patches
  [ if random-float 100 < density
    [ set pcolor yellow ] ]
  ;; randomly distribute termites
  create-turtles number [
    set color white
    setxy random-xcor random-ycor
    set size 5  ;; easier to see
  ]
end 

to go  ;; turtle procedure
  search-for-chip
  find-new-pile
  put-down-chip
end 

to search-for-chip  ;; turtle procedure -- "picks up chip" by turning orange
  ifelse pcolor = yellow
  [ set pcolor black
    set color orange
    fd 20 ]
  [ wiggle
    search-for-chip ]
end 

to find-new-pile  ;; turtle procedure -- look for yellow patches
  if pcolor != yellow
  [ wiggle
    find-new-pile ]
end 

to put-down-chip  ;; turtle procedure -- finds empty spot & drops chip
  ifelse pcolor = black
  [ set pcolor yellow
    set color white
    get-away ]
  [ rt random 360
    fd 1
    put-down-chip ]
end 

to get-away  ;; turtle procedure -- escape from yellow piles
  rt random 360
  fd 20
  if pcolor != black
    [ get-away ]
end 

to wiggle ; turtle procedure
  fd 1
  rt random 50
  lt random 50
end 


; Copyright 1997 Uri Wilensky.
; See Info tab for full copyright and license.

There are 10 versions of this model.

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Uri Wilensky over 11 years ago Updated to NetLogo 5.0.4 Download this version
Uri Wilensky about 12 years ago Updated version tag Download this version
Uri Wilensky about 12 years ago Updated to version from NetLogo 5.0.3 distribution Download this version
Uri Wilensky almost 13 years ago Updated to NetLogo 5.0 Download this version
Uri Wilensky over 14 years ago Updated from NetLogo 4.1 Download this version
Uri Wilensky over 14 years ago Updated from NetLogo 4.1 Download this version
Uri Wilensky over 14 years ago Updated from NetLogo 4.1 Download this version
Uri Wilensky over 14 years ago Updated from NetLogo 4.1 Download this version
Uri Wilensky over 14 years ago Model from NetLogo distribution Download this version
Uri Wilensky over 14 years ago Termites Download this version

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