Swarms in censored realities: how biological and technological collectives move in the dark

Agents with active sensor technology, such as echolocating bats or sonar-based robots, are confronted with the problem of mutual “blinding” or interference in groups. This is associated with the risk of collision, injury or death. Despite this intense interference, bats come together in their millions and form successful minimal-sensor swarms. Until now, it is not known how bats accomplish this impressive feat.

The goal of Dr. Beleyur's research group is to create a holistic framework to understand how biological and technical swarms can function with active sensing. To this end, multi-sensor observations of bat groups in nature and swarm robotics will be used and next-generation computational methods will be developed. The aim is to decipher how active sensor agents (e.g. bats, robots) can form collectives despite the very limited information they have access to.