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Life as we know it is the result of billions of years of evolution.
Throughout this time organisms have solved complex problems to survive — and studying them can help us solve ours.
This approach is called bio-inspiration — and it underpins this 2010 publication.
Researchers worked with Physarum polycephalum, a single-celled protist that is neither fungus, plant, animal, nor bacterium. They grew it on a surface representing a map of Tokyo, with food sources placed at metro station nodes. The organism expanded and created connections between them — building a transport network with efficiency, cost and fault tolerance comparable to the real subway system.
Is this extraordinary behaviour evidence of intelligence — or the outcome of a biochemical mechanism?