This app simulates the network effects of a multicellular slime mold (Physarum polycephalum), based on a 2010 paper by Jeff Jones: "Characteristics of pattern formation and evolution in approximations of Physarum transport networks" and work by Sage Jenson. In this simulation, simple particle "agents" interact with an underlying field of chemical attractants to form complex, emergent behaviors. All simulation steps are computed on the GPU via a series of WebGL fragment shaders. Written by Amanda Ghassaei.

Instructions: Touch/drag to add chemical attractant to the system. Change the parameters in the menu to control the dynamics of the system; several interesting presets have been preloaded. Press "v" to record a video.

This page is part of a series of examples using gpu-io, a GPU-accelerated computing library for physics simulations and other mathematical calculations. Find the source code on Github.