Physics & QBio Hagoromo Hour: Antonio Celani, ICTP

“The uses of memory in olfactory search”

Many organisms, from insects to mammals, have developed exquisite skills in searching for sources of odor, from huge distances and in highly unpredictable environments. How are sequences of sparse odor detections encoded in the memory of the searcher? And how are these translated into effective strategies to reach the source in the shortest time? In this talk I will review some attempts at answering these questions from an algorithmic viewpoint, with emphasis on the parsimonious usage of memory.

Hosts: Thierry Emonet and Michael Abbott