Artificial intelligence: Riders on a swarm | The Economist: "Intellidance
Swarmanoid robots may not much resemble the creatures that originally inspired the field, but insects continue to give programmers ideas. Dr Dorigo’s group has, for instance, developed a system to allow robots to detect when a swarm member is malfunctioning. This was inspired by the way some fireflies synchronise their light emissions so that entire trees flash on and off. The robots do the same, and if one light goes out of synch because of a malfunction the other bots can react quickly, either isolating the maverick so that it cannot cause trouble, or calling back to base to have it withdrawn."
