Towards Physarum robots: computing and manipulating on water surface

Andrew Adamatzky Computing, Engineering and Mathematical Sciences, University of the West of England, Bristol, United Kingdom and Bristol Robotics Laboratory, Bristol, United Kingdom andrew.adamatzky@uwe.ac.uk Abstract Plasmodium of Physarym polycephalum is an ideal biological substrate for implementing concurrent and parallel computation, including combinatorial geometry and optimization on graphs. We report results of scoping experiments on Physarum computing in conditions of minimal friction, on the water surface. We show that plasmodium of Physarum is capable for computing a basic spanning trees and manipulating of lightweight objects. We speculate that our results pave the pathways towards design and implementation of amorphous biological robots. Key words: biological computing, amorphous robots, unconventional computation, amoeba Introduction Plasmodium, the vegetative stage of slime mould Physarum polycephalum, is a single cell, with thousands of diploid nuclei, formed when individual flagellated cells or amoebas of Physarum polycephalum swarm together and fuse.