Plasmodium of acellular slime mould Physarum polycephalum is a very largeeukaryotic microbe visible to the unaided eye. During its foraging behaviourthe plasmodium spans sources of nutrients with a network of protoplasmic tubes.In this paper we attempt to address the following question: is slime mouldcapable of computing transport networks? By assuming the sources of nutrientsare cities and protoplasmic tubes connecting the sources are motorways, howwell does the plasmodium approximate existing motorway networks? We take theNetherlands as a case study for bio-development of motorways, while it has themost dense motorway network in Europe, current demand is rapidly approachingthe upper limits of existing capacity. We represent twenty major cities withoat flakes, place plasmodium in Amsterdam and record how the plasmodium spreadsbetween oat flakes via the protoplasmic tubes. First we analyseslime-mould-built and man-built transport networks in a framework of proximitygraphs to investigate if the slime mould is capable of computing existingnetworks. We then go on to investigate if the slime mould is able calculate oradapt the network through imitating restructuring of the transport network as aresponse to potential localized flooding of the Netherlands.
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