On manipulating attractors in collective behaviours of bio-hybrid societies

with robot interactionsRob Mills1, Luís Correia1, Thomas Schmickl2

BioISI, Faculty of Sciences, Universidade de Lisboa

Artificial Life Lab, Faculty of Zoology, Karl-Franzens University Graz

Collective animals and human interaction• Human activities interact with animals

• Agriculture, aquaculture

• Pollination services (esp. honeybees)

• Swarming locusts

• Can we manipulate how they act?• goods (bees=> pollinators) and

• bads (mosquitos=>disease)

• Lots of these animals exhibit collective behaviour• Sheep, cows, chickens• Bees, locusts, midges

Robo-ethology: social interactions using robots• A line of research with roots in ethology

• More direct than pure observation, stronger isolation of triggers

Partan et al 2009 Anim behav 77(5)Michelsen 1992 Behav ecol & sociobiol 30(3-4)

Taylor 2008 Animal behaviour 76(3)

Closing the loop

• Continuous immersion of robot in animal society

Vaughan et al 2000 Robot autonsyst 31(1)

Robot exploits the fear response -> gather the birds together

-> able to herd the ducks(move them to specified goal)

Closing the loop

• Continuous immersion of robot in animal society

Butler et al 2006 Int J. Robotics res 25(5-6)

Robot induces stress in some animals exploits the fear response -> cows move together; stressed signal shared

-> able to control position of cow herd

Bio-hybrid societies

• Continuous immersion of robot in animal society

Halloy et al 2007 Science 318(5853)

Robot is socially integrated: accepted as a cockroach

a) Robots programmed with behaviour like cockroach;

b) Substitute a few, and the animals still reach same decision

-> social acceptance; not fear here

Bio-hybrid societies – Agent provocateur

• Continuous immersion of robot in animal society

Halloy et al 2007 Science 318(5853)

Robot is socially integrated: accepted as a cockroach

c) Robots programmed with new environmental preference

d) A few robots can override the expected environmental preference

-> exploit social factors in cockroach to change collective outcome

Robots (prefer light shelter) + cockroaches

Just cockroaches

Steering a collective systemat

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darklight

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Self-amplification

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Robots with alternate

preference

Steering a collective systemat

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tive

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environ

social

+

darklight

Many othersFew othersat

trac

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Self-amplification

+darklight

Many othersFew othersat

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Robots with alternate

preference

• Efficiency: we didn’t invent a new behaviour; • rather, we modified the location of

attractor.

• Social amplification of signals • minority of robots exert sufficient

influence

• Or didn’t need to interfere with every animal

Bio-hybrid societies – closing the loop

•

• Behavioural study, with controllable interactions (long-term) to test hypotheses (e.g., what influences mating success)

• Create societies that have new functionality, ‘best of’ machine & animal

• (not: cyborgs; invasive to individuals.)

Exploit gaggle response to fear

Exploit herd response to stress

Exploit importance of social cohesion

(overriding env. factors)

Exploit filial imprinting (for social acceptance)

MORE complex societies!

• ASSISI|bf research project is about multi-species bio-hybrid societies, with bees and with fish (honey, zebra). Stripes

• Animals do not normally share habitats; can we bridge the link with robots?

An unworkable idea?

• If we are able to introduce novel interactions between species, via robots, • Original idea:

• Could we substitute a species lost from an ecosystem?

• crucial interactions that were maybe unavailable to the “substitute” could be provided by robot links?

• (non-trophic interspecies interactions – help!)

• More workable? Could one species be used to regulate another?• When is a virtual fence deployed?

• When should bees (not) exit hive?

Outlook: Non-invasive control/influence

• Potential applications

• Immersive monitoring, early warning of poor health• unexpected social dynamic

• Manipulate when bees swarm • [not whether they do]

• Encourage birds to flock in locations far from airports• [note bird of prey approach effective]

• Virtual fences, used in conservation ecology & farming

• Dynamic / selective; potentially cheaper in vast spaces

• Keep locusts in their solitary phase, out of gregarious phase.

• Improve FADs? Make them more species-specific to reduce by-catch• Again, could be predator fear based

approach

Outlook

• Bio-hybrid societies where robots have continuous interaction with collective animals• Manipulate collective behaviours, by nudging / exploiting the social factors

and feeding a society new information from robots

• Opportunities to steer, without excessive force or effort

• Problems? • Effort involved in identifying interaction points in each new species

• Unexpected, pathological attractors.

• Unintended consequences from meddling in ecosystems… [though at least successful robots won’t reproduce]

references