Study of starling formations points way for swarming robots

Scientists have uncovered a simple rule that explains how thousands of starlings flock in formation and hope to use the discovery in the future to coordinate swarms of robots.

The reasons why the starlings are able to fly with Red Arrow precision in vast numbers, tumbling and banking in nervous unison and without colliding, has tantalised scientists.

Now it turns out that the secret is for each bird to track seven others, says the first detailed direct observations to have been reported by STARFLAG -- Starlings in Flight -- a European project involving biologists, physicists, and economists.

The team used new methods to gather data on large flocks of starlings over the skies of Rome’s Termini railway station to test the various theories and found that the behaviour of flocking birds is very different from what was believed up to now.

Read full story in Telegraph.

The study itself is available online: Interaction Ruling Animal Collective Behaviour Depends on Topological rather than Metric Distance: Evidence from a Field Study (PDF format).