ABSTRACT
We have argued that embryological morphogenesis provides a model of how massive swarms of microscopic agents can be coordinated to assemble complex, multiscale hierarchical structures, that is, artificial morphogenesis or morphogenetic engineering. This is accomplished by understanding natural morphogenetic processes in mathematical terms, abstracting from the biological specifics, and implementing these mathematical principles in artificial systems. As have embryologists, we have found partial differential equations and continuum mechanics to be powerful mathematical tools for describing the behavior of very large numbers of very small agents, in fact, taking them to the continuum limit. In this way we intend to have algorithms that scale to very large swarms of microrobots. To this end we have developed a PDE-based notation for artificial morphogenesis and designed a prototype morphogenetic programming language. This language permits the precise description of morphogenetic algorithms and their automatic translation to simulation software, so that morphogenetic processes can be investigated.
