Eco-computing

The computational power of ecosystems -- or ecological reservoir computing -- is providing a new direction for rapidly developing AI technologies. Simulations have confirmed that ecological networks, such as prey-predator interactions, can efficiently process information and be utilized as a computational resource. One type is a computer-based approach called in silico ecological reservoir computing, which models hypothetical ecosystem dynamics and simulates the system response. The second is an empirical system called real-time ecological reservoir computing, which uses the real-time population dynamics of the unicellular organism Tetrahymena thermophila. "We have named this approach