Computing in nonlinear media and automata collectives

The subject of this book is computing in excitable and reaction-diffusion media. This is one approach to novel computing methods. Other approaches include quantum and evolutionary computation, and swarm optimization. The book explains how to design computing devices in nonlinear media. This is achieved in three steps. First, cellular automaton models of reaction-diffusion and excitable computing are built. Second, natural analogies of simulated phenomena are sought. Third, working prototypes of laboratory processors are fabricated. Throughout the book it is assumed a computation is implemented using spreading waves and spatially interacting reagents. The book is full of examples of computation in cellular automata, swarms of mobile machines, thin-layer chemical liquids, insect societies, solitons, breathers and other wonders of Nature.

In this book computer scientists and engineers will find blueprints inspired by Nature for the design of novel computing devices. Mathematicians will find exciting reasons to theorise. Physicists and chemists will be surprised and pleased to find that the systems they study can be used in completely new contexts. Biologists will discover that results of their field experiments also give solutions for celebrated mathematical problems.

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