[21a-A307-1~9] 3.1 Basic optics and frontier of optics (merged with formerly 3.2 Equipment optics and materials)

[21a-A307-5] Mimicking the Pheromone Communication of Ant Swarm with Phase Change Material and Colloidal Particles

〇(DC)bokusui nakayama¹, hiromori takahashi¹, hikaru nagase¹, yuta saito², shogo hatayama², eiji yamamoto¹, toshiharu saiki¹ (1.Keio Univ., 2.AIST)

Keywords:swarm intelligence, phase change material, colloids

An ant swarm utilizes the indirect communication via external memories (evaporative pheromone) to complete tasks. For mimicking the pheromone communication, we built an electro fluidic system containing colloidal Janus particles and phase change material Ge2Sb2Te5 (GST). When laser irradiation is given, the GST layer is crystallized locally beneath the Janus particle due to a lens heating effect and the Janus particle leave a crystalline trail behind its trajectory with its self-propulsion. Under AC field application, the high conductivity of crystalline trail causes field concentration and generates AC-electroosmotic flow (ACEO flow). We utilize the ACEO flow to attract other Janus particles toward the crystalline trail, and the tracing motion of the particles was observed experimentally.