# A review of swarmalators and their potential in bio-inspired computing

## TL;DR

This paper reviews the concept of swarmalators, systems that combine swarming and synchronization, highlighting their theoretical models, natural occurrences, and potential technological applications in bio-inspired computing.

## Contribution

It synthesizes recent theoretical developments on swarmalators, explores their natural realizations, and discusses their potential in advancing bio-inspired robotic systems.

## Key findings

- Swarmalators exhibit complex spatiotemporal patterns.
- Potential applications include robotic swarms and sensor networks.
- Theoretical models suggest versatile real-world implementations.

## Abstract

From fireflies to heart cells, many systems in Nature show the remarkable ability to spontaneously fall into synchrony. By imitating Nature's success at self-synchronizing, scientists have designed cost-effective methods to achieve synchrony in the lab, with applications ranging from wireless sensor networks to radio transmission. A similar story has occurred in the study of swarms, where inspiration from the behavior flocks of birds and schools of fish has led to 'low-footprint' algorithms for multi-robot systems. Here, we continue this 'bio-inspired' tradition, by speculating on the technological benefit of fusing swarming with synchronization. The subject of recent theoretical work, minimal models of so-called 'swarmalator' systems exhibit rich spatiotemporal patterns, hinting at utility in 'bottom-up' robotic swarms. We review the theoretical work on swarmalators, identify possible realizations in Nature, and discuss their potential applications in technology.