Abstract:
Plants can solve amazingly difficult tasks while adjusting their growth and development to the environment. They can explore and exploit several resources simultaneously, even when the distributions of these vary in space and time. The systematic study of plant behaviour goes back to Darwin\'s book The power of movement in plants. Current research has highlighted that modularity is a key to understanding plant behaviour, as the production, functional specialization and death of modules enable the plant to adjust its movement to the environment. The adjustment is assisted by a flow of information and resources among the modules. Experiments have yielded many results about these processes in various plant species. Theoretical research, however, has lagged behind the empirical studies, possibly owing to the lack of a proper modelling framework that could encompass the high number of components and interactions. In this paper, I propose such a framework on the basis of network theory, viewing the plant as a group of connected, semi-autonomous agents. I review some characteristic plant responses to the environment through changing the states of agents and/or links. I also point out some unexplored areas, in which a dialogue between plant science and network theory could be mutually inspiring. This article is part of the theme issue \'Liquid brains, solid brains: How distributed cognitive architectures process information\'.
摘要:
植物可以解决令人惊讶的艰巨任务,同时根据环境调整其生长和发育。他们可以同时探索和开发多种资源,即使这些分布在空间和时间上有所不同。对植物行为的系统研究可以追溯到达尔文的著作《植物中运动的力量》。当前的研究强调,模块化是理解植物行为的关键,作为生产,模块的功能专业化和死亡使工厂能够调整其对环境的移动。模块之间的信息和资源流动有助于调整。实验已经在各种植物物种中产生了关于这些过程的许多结果。理论研究,然而,落后于实证研究,可能是由于缺乏适当的建模框架,该框架可以包含大量的组件和相互作用。在本文中,我在网络理论的基础上提出了这样一个框架,将植物视为一群相连的人,半自治代理。我通过改变代理和/或链接的状态来回顾一些特有的植物对环境的反应。我还指出了一些未开发的领域,植物科学和网络理论之间的对话可以相互激励。这篇文章是主题问题的一部分\'液体大脑,坚实的大脑:分布式认知架构如何处理信息。