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SUMMARY:Plankton Blinders: navigating turbulence with limited information 
 - Professor Christophe Eloy\, Centrale Marseille
DTSTART:20241129T160000Z
DTEND:20241129T170000Z
UID:TALK222313@talks.cam.ac.uk
CONTACT:Professor Grae Worster
DESCRIPTION:Plankton face the challenging task of navigating oceanic turbu
 lence using only hydrodynamic and chemical cues to escape predators or cat
 ch prey. In this seminar\, I will explore the canonical planktonic navigat
 ion problem of vertical migration\, where a planktonic organism aims to mo
 ve upward or downward as quickly as possible through turbulence\, relying 
 solely on local flow velocity gradients.\n\nI will begin with a theoretica
 l model that assumes flow gradients remain approximately uniform and stead
 y over a certain time. Under this assumption\, the optimal swimming direct
 ion can be derived analytically. Numerical simulations show that agents im
 plementing this strategy can ‘surf’ on turbulence\, exhibiting average
  vertical speeds of up to twice their swimming speed. Experimental results
  from larval snails provide further support for this surfing strategy\, as
  these organisms actively respond to velocity gradients\, counteracting lo
 cal vorticity.\n\nNext\, I will explore the use of deep reinforcement lear
 ning techniques to learn similar navigation strategies in partially observ
 able environments. Despite the current limitations in reinforcement learni
 ng within this context\, it presents unique potential for solving more com
 plex navigation problems\, such as agents with memory\, multiple sensors\,
  or cooperative behaviour. Finally\, I will present an approach to design 
 passive flexible agents capable of mimicking these surfing behaviours\, of
 fering novel insights into both planktonic organisms navigating turbulent 
 flows.\n\n
LOCATION:MR2
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