User:DanielWong1972/Quorum sensing

Robotics and computing
Quorum sensing can be a useful tool for improving the function of self-organizing networks such as the SECOAS (Self-Organizing Collegiate Sensor) environmental monitoring system. In this system, individual nodes sense that there is a population of other nodes with similar data to report. The population then nominates just one node to report the data, resulting in power savings. Ad hoc wireless networks can also benefit from quorum sensing, by allowing the system to detect and respond to network conditions.

Quorum sensing can also be used to coordinate the behavior of autonomous robot swarms. Using a process similar to that used by Temnothorax ants, robots can make rapid group decisions without the direction of a controller. In a 2021 study headed by professor Theodore P. Pavlic of Arizona State University, researchers examined the feasibility of modeling engineered systems after algorithms based on Quorum Sensing observed in nature. They focused on what allowed ants to use Quorum Sensing in nest-site selection tasks, noting that ants were able to somehow able to estimate proximity of a population to its upper limit. They found that it would be difficult to emulate in nanoscale robots which do not have large memory storage. While attempts have been made to fully emulate quorum sensing, this is a field of computing that is still largely unexplored and will require more research to develop.

Many have begun to conduct studies attempting to replicate the bacteria to bacteria communication of Quorum Sensing in robotics. With the goal of utilizing a large group of nanoscale robots to complete a task instead of a single robot in to increase efficiency, Quorum Sensing communication has been used for nanoscale robots to work together. A study done by researchers at MIT emulated Quorum Sensing by communication through transmitting/receiving diffusing signals, programmable response thresholds, and receiving quorum quenching. They were able to achieve triggering quorum quenching through proximity of a specific target cell. These advances in nanoscale technology could allow for important future developments in industry, manufacturing, and medicine.

With the capacities of technology developing a rapid rates, there have been many experiments conducted in attempts to use Quorum Sensing algorithms for using nanoscale robots to combat cancer, creating scalable communication networks , and creating multi-agent robots to carry out tasks. Quorum Sensing algorithms will continue to play large roles in the development of robotics and may pave the way for more technology that emulates nature.