Negative Feedback as a Noise Suppression Mechanism in Collective Foraging

Explore a 43-minute research presentation examining how social insect colonies utilize negative feedback signals in foraging behavior, delivered by James Marshall from the University of Sheffield at IPAM's Modeling Multi-Scale Collective Intelligences Workshop. Delve into the fascinating world of ants and bees to understand how individual foragers employ negative pheromones and mechano-auditory signals to communicate unfavorable foraging conditions, such as unrewarded, crowded, or dangerous situations. Discover a novel proposed function of negative feedback signals in variance reduction, supported by stochastic solution analysis of finite system size dynamics. Learn why this mechanism might be crucial for biological systems' robustness and optimal foraging distributions, drawing parallels with negative feedback applications in electronic circuits and other biological systems, including potential implications for brain function.