Finite-size scaling as a way to probe near-criticality in natural swarms

Abstract

Collective behaviour in biological systems is often accompanied by strong correlations. The question has therefore arisen of whether correlation is amplified by the vicinity to some critical point in the parameters space. Biological systems, though, are typically quite far from the thermodynamic limit, so that the value of the control parameter at which correlation and susceptibility peak depend on size. Hence, a system would need to readjust its control parameter according to its size in order to be maximally correlated. This readjustment, though, has never been observed experimentally. By gathering three-dimensional data on swarms of midges in the field we find that swarms tune their control parameter and size so as to maintain a scaling behaviour of the correlation function. As a consequence, correlation length and susceptibility scale with the system's size and swarms exhibit a near-maximal degree of correlation at all sizes.

arXiv commentSelected for Viewpoint in Physics; PRL Editor's Suggestion

References in corpus (16)

• Power-law distributions in empirical data
• Novel type of phase transition in a system of self-driven particles
• Interaction Ruling Animal Collective Behaviour Depends on Topological rather than Metric Distance: Evidence from a Field Study
• Flocks, herds, and schools: A quantitative theory of flocking
• Scale-free correlations in bird flocks
• Are biological systems poised at criticality?
• Collective motion of self-propelled particles interacting without cohesion
• Critical exponents and equation of state of the three-dimensional Heisenberg universality class
• Maximum entropy models for antibody diversity
• Collective behaviour without collective order in wild swarms of midges
• Kinetic Ising model in an oscillating field: Finite-size scaling at the dynamic phase transition
• Social interactions dominate speed control in driving natural flocks toward criticality
• New aspects of the continuous phase transition in the scalar noise model (SNM) of collective motion
• Collective motion of organisms in three dimensions
• On the criticality of inferred models
• Phase transition in the scalar noise model of collective motion in three dimensions

Cited by in corpus (66)

• Colloquium: Criticality and dynamical scaling in living systems
• Spontaneous velocity alignment in Motility-induced Phase Separation
• Emergent oscillations assist obstacle negotiation during ant cooperative transport
• Dynamic scaling in natural swarms
• Collective Motion of Self-Propelled Particles with Memory
• Local equilibrium in bird flocks
• Mitochondrial network complexity emerges from fission/fusion dynamics
• A particle-field representation unifies paradigms in active matter
• Collective response to perturbations in a data-driven fish school model
• Long-range Acoustic Interactions in Insect Swarms: An Adaptive Gravity Model
• Critical fluctuations in proteins native states
• Control of critical behavior in a small-scale social system
• How many dissenters does it take to disorder a flock?
• Perspectives on theory at the interface of physics and biology
• Collective predator evasion: Putting the criticality hypothesis to the test
• GReTA - a novel Global and Recursive Tracking Algorithm in three dimensions
• A Critical-like Collective State Leads to Long-range Cell Communication in Dictyostelium discoideum Aggregation
• Finite-size scaling at the edge of disorder in a time-delay Vicsek model
• Marginal speed confinement resolves the conflict between correlation and control in natural flocks of birds
• Natural Swarms in $3.99$ Dimensions
• Collective behavior of self-steering active particles with velocity alignment and visual perception
• Short-range interaction vs long-range correlation in bird flocks
• Scale free chaos in the confined Vicsek flocking model
• Signatures of irreversibility in microscopic models of flocking
• Contrarian compulsions produce time dependent flocking of active particles
• Phase Transitions and Criticality in the Collective Behavior of Animals -- Self-organization and biological function
• Balancing selfishness and norm conformity can explain human behavior in large-scale Prisoner's Dilemma games and can poise human groups near criticality
• Universality of biochemical feedback and its application to immune cells
• Critical phenomena in the temperature-pressure-crowding phase diagram of a protein
• Spatio-temporal correlations in models of collective motion ruled by different dynamical laws
• Correlation functions as a tool to study collective behaviour phenomena in biological systems
• Dominating Lengthscales of Zebrafish Collective Behaviour
• Signatures of criticality in turning avalanches of schooling fish
• Transition to Synchrony in a Three-Dimensional Swarming Model with Helical Trajectories
• Non-Ergodic Complexity Management
• Renormalization group crossover in the critical dynamics of field theories with mode coupling terms
• Equilibrium to off-equilibrium crossover in homogeneous active matter
• Error control in the set-up of stereo camera systems for 3d animal tracking
• Scale-free correlations in the dynamics of a small (N ~ 10000) cortical network
• Collective movement in alarmed animals groups: a simple model with positional forces and a limited attention field
• Similarities between Insect Swarms and Isothermal Globular Clusters
• Inferring couplings in networks across order-disorder phase transitions
• Crossover between parabolic and hyperbolic scaling, oscillatory modes and resonances near flocking
• Mean field theory of chaotic insect swarms
• Social Phases in Human Movement
• Flocking at the edge of chaos
• Dynamical renormalization group for mode-coupling field theories with solenoidal constraint
• Vectorial active matter on the lattice: polar condensates and nematic filaments
• Power laws of natural swarms are fingerprints of an extended critical region
• Collective decision-making with heterogeneous biases: Role of network topology and susceptibility
• Scale-free chaos in the 2D harmonically confined Vicsek model
• Finite-size correlation behavior near a critical point: a simple metric for monitoring the state of a neural network
• Hermitian and non-Hermitian topology in active matter
• Extrinsic vs Intrinsic Criticality in Systems with Many Components
• Discrete Laplacian thermostat for flocks and swarms: the fully conserved Inertial Spin Model
• Universal scaling relation and criticality in metabolism and growth of Escherichia coli
• Survival chances of a prey swarm: how the cooperative interaction range affects the outcome
• Free chiral self-propelled robots compared to active Brownian circle swimmers
• Excess of Social Behavior Reduces the Capacity to Respond to Perturbations
• Active chain spirograph: Dynamic patterns formed in extensible chains due to follower activity
• Analysis of aligning active local searchers orbiting around their common home position
• Beehive scale-free emergent dynamics
• How initial distribution affects symmetry breaking induced by panic in ants: experiment and flee-pheromone model
• Pair Formation in Insect Swarms Driven by Adaptive Long-Range Interactions
• The Inertial Spin Model of flocking with position-dependent forces
• Finite-time scaling on low-dimensional map bifurcations