Self-organized systems as a research area investigate distributed processes in which macroscopic order, structure, or function emerges from local interactions among many components without centralized control. The field encompasses theoretical modeling, analysis, and simulation of nonlinear dynamical systems, often drawing on statistical physics, complex systems theory, network science, and information theory. Research focuses on identifying generic mechanisms (e.g., feedback loops, pattern formation, criticality), characterizing robustness and adaptability, and deriving principles that explain emergent behavior in physical, biological, social, and engineered systems, with applications to swarm robotics, decentralized control, collective decision-making, and adaptive infrastructure.
Researchers at the University of Vienna have discovered a key mechanism that enables sea anemones to regenerate into fully developed organisms from disorganized clusters of cells. The study, published in Nature Communications, ...
Cell & Microbiology
Jul 21, 2026
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Cells can spontaneously change shape even without external signals, but the underlying mechanisms behind this form of self-organization have remained unclear. Now, researchers from Japan have discovered self-propelled treadmilling ...
Cell & Microbiology
Jun 25, 2026
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Pack enough string-like objects together, and they will begin to align with one another. But replace the strings with worms or bacteria living in your gut, and this self-organization becomes much more difficult. A team of ...
Soft Matter
Jun 13, 2026
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How did life make the leap from single cells to coordinated, multicellular organisms? And how do genetically identical cells still perform a version of that feat every time an embryo begins to take shape?
Evolution
Jun 2, 2026
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Researchers in Spain have discovered that in collectives of moving fire ants, rippling "waves" of density and activity are likely triggered by local regions where ants collectively travel in the same direction as their neighbors.
As conflict intensifies in the Middle East, energy markets swing wildly and the cost of living keeps climbing, a pressing question is emerging for anyone who is tied in to the fluctuating energy and food markets: how do we ...
Environment
Apr 22, 2026
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Researchers in Belgium have unveiled a striking chemical reaction in which ripples along a frozen reaction front resemble the rays of a shining star. Publishing their results in Physical Review Letters, Anne De Wit and colleagues ...
Living cells are highly organized, yet they are not assembled using rigid blueprints or by following a predetermined plan. Instead, order emerges on its own from countless interactions between molecules that are constantly ...
Cell & Microbiology
Feb 18, 2026
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A perspective in the Journal of the Royal Society Interface argues that advances in AI, sensing technologies and modeling are transforming the study of collective animal behavior, with implications reaching far beyond biology, ...
Ecology
Feb 1, 2026
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The sensory proteins that control the motion of bacteria constantly fluctuate. AMOLF researchers, together with international collaborators from ETH Zurich and University of Utah, found out that these proteins can jointly ...
Cell & Microbiology
Jan 29, 2026
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