Chaos and Budworm Dynamics of Agent Interactions: A Biologically-Inspired Approach to Digital Ecosystems

Abstract

A primary motivation for research in digital ecosystems is the desire to exploit the self-organized properties of natural ecosystems. Ecosystems are thought to be robust, scalable architectures that can automatically solve complex, dynamic problems. However, the biological processes that contribute to these properties have not been made explicit in digital ecosystem research. Here, we discuss how biological properties contribute to the self-organized features of natural ecosystems. These properties include populations of evolving agents, a complex dynamic environment, and spatial distributions which generate local interactions. The potential for exploiting these properties is then considered. Theoretical and conceptually inspired from nature, the digital ecosystem could behave at large complex cycles of stability through alternate stable states. These approaches suggest that incorporating ideas from theoretical ecology can contribute to useful self-organized properties in digital ecosystems.