Aggregation

02/09/2009 at 10:00 a.m.

We've all marvelled at fish swimming in schools and starlings whirling around in the evening sky. Why do they do that? How do they do that? And what does it say about their societies, or ours? Today on Weekday, we'll discuss the science of aggregation.

Guest(s)

Julia Parrish is director of the Program on the Environment and associate director of the School of Aquatic and Fishery Sciences at the University of Washington.

Vijay Kumar is a professor at the School of Engineering and Applied Sciences at the University of Pennsylvania. He is working on engineering autonomous robots using the principles of swarming behavior.

Iain Couzin is assistant professor in the department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at Princeton University. He studies self–organized pattern formation in a wide range of biological systems, including ants, fish schools, bird flocks, locust/cricket swarms and human crowds.