Scale-free correlations in starling flocks

被引:716
作者
Cavagna, Andrea [1 ,2 ]
Cimarelli, Alessio [2 ]
Giardina, Irene [1 ,2 ]
Parisi, Giorgio [2 ,3 ,4 ]
Santagati, Raffaele [2 ]
Stefanini, Fabio [2 ]
Viale, Massimiliano [1 ,2 ]
机构
[1] CNR, Ist Sistemi Complessi, I-00185 Rome, Italy
[2] Univ Roma La Sapienza, Dipartimento Fis, I-00185 Rome, Italy
[3] Univ Roma La Sapienza, Sez Ist Nazl Fis Nucl, I-00185 Rome, Italy
[4] CNR, Ist Proc Chim Fis, Unita Organizzat Supporto Roma, I-00185 Rome, Italy
关键词
animal groups; collective behavior; flocking; self-organization; emergent behavior; COLLECTIVE ANIMAL BEHAVIOR; STARFLAG HANDBOOK;
D O I
10.1073/pnas.1005766107
中图分类号
O [数理科学和化学]; P [天文学、地球科学]; Q [生物科学]; N [自然科学总论];
学科分类号
07 ; 0710 ; 09 ;
摘要
From bird flocks to fish schools, animal groups often seem to react to environmental perturbations as if of one mind. Most studies in collective animal behavior have aimed to understand how a globally ordered state may emerge from simple behavioral rules. Less effort has been devoted to understanding the origin of collective response, namely the way the group as a whole reacts to its environment. Yet, in the presence of strong predatory pressure on the group, collective response may yield a significant adaptive advantage. Here we suggest that collective response in animal groups may be achieved through scale-free behavioral correlations. By reconstructing the 3D position and velocity of individual birds in large flocks of starlings, we measured to what extent the velocity fluctuations of different birds are correlated to each other. We found that the range of such spatial correlation does not have a constant value, but it scales with the linear size of the flock. This result indicates that behavioral correlations are scale free: The change in the behavioral state of one animal affects and is affected by that of all other animals in the group, no matter how large the group is. Scale-free correlations provide each animal with an effective perception range much larger than the direct interindividual interaction range, thus enhancing global response to perturbations. Our results suggest that flocks behave as critical systems, poised to respond maximally to environmental perturbations.
引用
收藏
页码:11865 / 11870
页数:6
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