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Natural Algorithms and Influence Systems.

Algorithms offer a rich, expressive language for modelers of biological and social systems. They lay the grounds for numerical simulations and, crucially, provide a powerful framework for their analysis. The new area of natural algorithms may reprise in the life sciences the role differential equati...

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Published in:Communications of the ACM Vol. 55; no. 12; pp. 101 - 111
Main Author: Chazelle, Bernard
Format: Article
Published: Association for Computing Machinery Dec2012
Subjects:
Algorithm research
Discrete-time systems
Biological systems
Mathematical models
Social systems
Multiagent systems
Physical sciences research
Online Access:View this record in EBSCOhost
Summary:Algorithms offer a rich, expressive language for modelers of biological and social systems. They lay the grounds for numerical simulations and, crucially, provide a powerful framework for their analysis. The new area of natural algorithms may reprise in the life sciences the role differential equations have long played in the physical sciences. For this to happen, however, an "algorithmic calculus" is needed. We discuss what this program entails in the context of influence systems, a broad family of multiagent models arising in social dynamics.