About Me
Simon Garnier is an Associate Professor of Biology at the New Jersey Institute of Technology. He is the head of the Swarm Lab, an interdisciplinary research lab that studies the mechanisms underlying Collective Behaviors and Swarm Intelligence in natural and artificial systems (http://www.theswarmlab.com). His research aims to reveal the detailed functioning of collective intelligence in systems as diverse as ant colonies, human crowds or robotic swarms. Dr. Garnier received a B.Sc. in Cell and Molecular Biology in 2002 from the University of Bordeaux. He received his M.Sc. in Neuroscience and Cognition in 2004 and his Ph.D. in Animal Behavior in 2008 from the University of Toulouse, both under the direction of Dr. Guy Theraulaz.
Education
Ph.D.; Université de Toulouse; Ethology; 2008
M.S.; Université de Toulouse; Neuroscience And Behavior; 2004
B.S.; Université Victor Segalen - Bordeaux II; Cell And Molecular Biology; 2002
Website
2026 Fall Courses
BIOL 320 - DISCOVERING BIOL RESEARCH - HONORS
BIOL 492 - RESEARCH & INDEPENDENT STUDY
BIOL 790B - DOCT DISSERTATION & RESRCH
BIOL 790D - DOCT DISSERTATION & RESRCH
BIOL 491 - SENIOR PROJECT
BIOL 725 - INDEPENDENT STUDY I
BIOL 790E - DOCTORAL DISSERTATION
BIOL 726 - INDEPENDENT STUDY II
BIOL 790C - DOCTORAL DISSERTN & RESRCH
BIOL 790A - DOCT DISSERTATION & RESRCH
BIOL 792B - PRE-DOCTORAL RESEARCH
BIOL 792C - PRE-DOCTORAL RESEARCH
BIOL 700B - MASTER'S PROJECT
Teaching Interests
Collective Intelligence, Science Communication, Statistics and Data Analysis
Past Courses
BIOL 225: INSECTS AND HUMAN SOCIETY
BIOL 320: DISCOVERING BIOL RESEARCH
BIOL 320: DISCOVERING BIOL RESEARCH - HONORS
BIOL 320: DISCOVERING BIOLOGICAL RESEARCH
BIOL 337: COLLECTIVE INTEL IN BIOL SYST
BIOL 698: ST: COLLECTIVE INTELLIGENCE: ANALYSIS AND MODELING
BIOL 698: ST: FROM ANT TO TWITTERERS
Research Interests
Collective Behavior and Intelligence, Swarm Intelligence, Swarm Robotics, Social Behaviors
Journal Article
Simon J. Garnier, Moussa\"\id, Mehdi. 2022. "We the swarm---Methodological, theoretical, and societal (r)evolutions in collective decision-making research." Collective Intelligence, vol. 1, no. 1, pp. 26339137221133400.
Helen F McCreery, Georgina Gemayel, Ana Isabel Pais, Simon J. Garnier, Radhika Nagpal. 2022. "Hysteresis stabilizes dynamic control of self-assembled army ant constructions." Nature communications, vol. 13, no. 1, pp. 1--13.
Wi\'sniewska, Maggie, Ivan Puga-Gonzalez, Phyllis Lee, Cynthia Moss, Gareth J. Russell, Simon J. Garnier, Sueur, C\'edric. 2022. "Simulated poaching affects global connectivity and efficiency in social networks of African savanna elephants-An exemplar of how human disturbance impacts group-living species." PLoS computational biology, vol. 18, no. 1, pp. e1009792.
Leslie W Kennedy, Joel M Caplan, Simon J. Garnier, Kim Lersch, Mir\'o-Llinares, Fernando, Gibbs Van
Brunschot, Erin E, David Lopez. 2021. "Editorial: Using Evidence Based Analytics to Create Narratives for Police Decision Making." Frontiers in psychology, vol. 12, pp. 791605.
Matthew J Lutz, Chris R Reid, Christopher J Lustri, Albert B Kao, Simon J. Garnier, Iain D Couzin. 2021. "Individual error correction drives responsive self-assembly of army ant scaffolds." Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, vol. 118, no. 17.
Douglas Blackiston, Emma Lederer, Sam Kriegman, Simon J. Garnier, Joshua Bongard, Michael Levin. 2021. "A cellular platform for the development of synthetic living machines." Science Robotics, vol. 6, no. 52.
Mark W Moffett, Simon J. Garnier, Kathleen M Eisenhardt, Nathan R Furr, Massimo Warglien, Costanza Sartoris, William Ocasio, Knudsen, Thorbj\orn, Lars A Bach, Joachim Offenberg. 2021. "Ant colonies: building complex organizations with minuscule brains and no leaders." Journal of Organization Design.
D W E Sankey, L R O'Bryan, Simon J. Garnier, G Cowlishaw, P Hopkins, M Holton, F\"urtbauer, I, King, A J. 2021. "Consensus of travel direction is achieved by simple copying, not voting, in free-ranging goats." Royal Society open science, vol. 8, no. 2, pp. 201128.
Justin Troy Walsh, Simon J. Garnier, Timothy A Linksvayer. 2020. "Ant collective behavior is heritable and shaped by selection." The American naturalist, pp. 567503.
Julia E Samson, Dylan D Ray, Maurizio Porfiri, Laura A Miller, Simon J. Garnier. 2020. "Collective Pulsing in Xeniid Corals: Part I-Using Computer Vision and Information Theory to Search for Coordination." Bulletin of mathematical biology, vol. 82, no. 7, pp. 90.
K R Pilkiewicz, B H Lemasson, M A Rowland, A Hein, J Sun, A Berdahl, M L Mayo, J Moehlis, M Porfiri, Fern\'andez-Juricic, E, Simon J. Garnier, E M Bollt, J M Carlson, M R Tarampi, K L Macuga, L Rossi, C-C Shen. 2020. "Decoding collective communications using information theory tools." Journal of the Royal Society, Interface / the Royal Society, vol. 17, no. 164, pp. 20190563.
Lisa O'Bryan, Nicole Abaid, Shinnosuke Nakayama, Tanujit Dey, Andrew King, Guy Cowlishaw, Daniel Rubenstein, Simon J. Garnier. 2019. "Contact Calls Facilitate Group Contraction in Free-ranging Goats (Capra aegagrus hircus)." Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution, vol. 7, pp. 73.
Elio Tuci, Vito Trianni, Andrew King, Simon J. Garnier. 2019. "Editorial: Novel Technological and Methodological Tools for the Understanding of Collective Behaviors." Frontiers in Robotics and AI, vol. 6, pp. 139.
Subash Ray, Gabriele Valentini, Purva Shah, Abid Haque, Chris Reid, Gregory Weber, Simon J. Garnier. 2019. "Information Transfer During Food Choice in the Slime Mold Physarum polycephalum." Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution, vol. 7, pp. 67.
Eliza J T Middleton, Simon J. Garnier, Tanya Latty, Chris R Reid. 2019. "Temporal and spatial pattern of trail clearing in the Australian meat ant, Iridomyrmex purpureus." Animal behaviour, vol. 150, pp. 97--111.
Helen L Moser, Anton P Doe, Kristen Meier, Simon J. Garnier, Damien Laudier, Haruhiko Akiyama, Matthias A Zumstein, Leesa M Galatz, Alice H Huang. 2018. "Genetic lineage tracing of targeted cell populations during enthesis healing." Journal of orthopaedic research: official publication of the Orthopaedic Research Society, vol. 36, no. 12, pp. 3275--3284.
Simon J. Garnier, Joel M Caplan, Leslie W Kennedy. 2018. "Predicting Dynamical Crime Distribution From Environmental and Social Influences." Frontiers in Applied Mathematics and Statistics, vol. 4, pp. 13.
Tim Ireland, Simon J. Garnier. 2018. "Architecture, space and information in constructions built by humans and social insects: a conceptual review." Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences, vol. 373, no. 1753.
Johann Delcourt, Noam Y Miller, Iain D Couzin, Simon J. Garnier. 2018. "Methods for the effective study of collective behavior in a radial arm maze." Behavior research methods, vol. 50, no. 4, pp. 1673--1685.
Jason M Graham, Albert B Kao, Dylana A Wilhelm, Simon J. Garnier. 2017. "Optimal construction of army ant living bridges." Journal of theoretical biology, vol. 435, pp. 184--198.
Simon J. Garnier, Daniel J C Kronauer. 2017. "The adaptive significance of phasic colony cycles in army ants." Journal of theoretical biology, vol. 428, pp. 43--47.
Chris R Reid, Hannelore MacDonald, Richard P Mann, Marshall, James A R, Tanya Latty, Simon J. Garnier. 2016. "Decision-making without a brain: how an amoeboid organism solves the two-armed bandit." Journal of the Royal Society, Interface / the Royal Society, vol. 13, no. 119, pp. 20160030.
Chris R Reid, Matthew J Lutz, Scott Powell, Albert B Kao, Iain D Couzin, Simon J. Garnier. 2015. "Army ants dynamically adjust living bridges in response to a cost-benefit trade-off." Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, vol. 112, no. 49, pp. 15113--15118.
Marco Dorigo, Mauro Birattari, Simon J. Garnier, Heiko Hamann, de Oca, Marco A Montes, Christine Solnon, St\"utzle, Thomas. 2015. "ANTS 2014 special issue: Editorial." Swarm Intelligence, vol. 9, no. 2-3, pp. 71--73.
Vela-P\'erez, M, M A Fontelos, Simon J. Garnier. 2015. "From individual to collective dynamics in Argentine ants (Linepithema humile)." Mathematical biosciences, vol. 262, pp. 56--64.
Chris R Reid, Simon J. Garnier, Madeleine Beekman, Tanya Latty. 2015. "Information integration and multiattribute decision making in non-neuronal organisms." Animal behaviour, vol. 100, pp. 44--50.
P\'erez-Escudero, Alfonso, Noam Miller, Andrew T Hartnett, Simon J. Garnier, Iain D Couzin, Gonzalo G de Polavieja. 2013. "Estimation models describe well collective decisions among three options." Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, vol. 110, no. 37, pp. E3466--7.
Noam Miller, Simon J. Garnier, Andrew T Hartnett, Iain D Couzin. 2013. "Both information and social cohesion determine collective decisions in animal groups." Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, vol. 110, no. 13, pp. 5263--5268.
Simon J. Garnier, Maud Combe, Christian Jost, Guy Theraulaz. 2013. "Do ants need to estimate the geometrical properties of trail bifurcations to find an efficient route? A swarm robotics test bed." PLoS computational biology, vol. 9, no. 3, pp. e1002903.
Simon J. Garnier, Tucker Murphy, Matthew Lutz, Edward Hurme, Simon Leblanc, Iain D Couzin. 2013. "Stability and responsiveness in a self-organized living architecture." PLoS computational biology, vol. 9, no. 3, pp. e1002984.
Andrea Perna, Boris Granovskiy, Simon J. Garnier, Stamatios C Nicolis, Lab\'edan, Marjorie, Guy Theraulaz, Fourcassi\'e, Vincent, David J T Sumpter. 2012. "Individual rules for trail pattern formation in Argentine ants (Linepithema humile)." PLoS computational biology, vol. 8, no. 7, pp. e1002592.
Andrew C Gallup, Joseph J Hale, David J T Sumpter, Simon J. Garnier, Alex Kacelnik, John R Krebs, Iain D Couzin. 2012. "Visual attention and the acquisition of information in human crowds." Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, vol. 109, no. 19, pp. 7245--7250.
Simon J. Garnier. 2011. "From Ants to Robots and Back : How Robotics Can Contribute to the Study of Collective Animal Behavior." Bio-Inspired Self-Organizing Robotic Systems, vol. 355, pp. 105--120.
Alexandre Campo, Simon J. Garnier, D\'edriche, Olivier, Mouhcine Zekkri, Marco Dorigo. 2011. "Self-organized discrimination of resources." PloS one, vol. 6, no. 5, pp. e19888.
Alexandre Campo, Guti\'errez, Alvaro, Shervin Nouyan, Carlo Pinciroli, Valentin Longchamp, Simon J. Garnier, Marco Dorigo. 2010. "Artificial pheromone for path selection by a foraging swarm of robots." Biological cybernetics, vol. 103, no. 5, pp. 339--352.
Moussa\"\id, Mehdi, Niriaska Perozo, Simon J. Garnier, Dirk Helbing, Guy Theraulaz. 2010. "The walking behaviour of pedestrian social groups and its impact on crowd dynamics." PloS one, vol. 5, no. 4, pp. e10047.
Moussa\"\id, Mehdi, Dirk Helbing, Simon J. Garnier, Anders Johansson, Maud Combe, Guy Theraulaz. 2009. "Experimental study of the behavioural mechanisms underlying self-organization in human crowds." Proceedings. Biological sciences / The Royal Society, vol. 276, no. 1668, pp. 2755--2762.
Mehdi Moussaid, Simon J. Garnier, Guy Theraulaz, Dirk Helbing. 2009. "Collective information processing and pattern formation in swarms, flocks, and crowds." Topics in cognitive science, vol. 1, no. 3, pp. 469--497.
Simon J. Garnier, Gu\'er\'echeau, Aur\'elie, Maud Combe, Fourcassi\'e, Vincent, Guy Theraulaz. 2009. "Path selection and foraging efficiency in Argentine ant transport networks." Behavioral ecology and sociobiology, vol. 63, no. 8, pp. 1167--1179.
Simon J. Garnier, J Gautrais, M Asadpour, C Jost, G Theraulaz. 2009. "Self-Organized Aggregation Triggers Collective Decision Making in a Group of Cockroach-Like Robots." Adaptive behavior, vol. 17, no. 2, pp. 109--133.
Gerbier, Gr\'egory, Simon J. Garnier, Rieu, C\'ecile, Guy Theraulaz, Fourcassi\'e, Vincent. 2008. "Are ants sensitive to the geometry of tunnel bifurcation?." Animal cognition, vol. 11, no. 4, pp. 637--642.
Simon J. Garnier, Christian Jost, Jacques Gautrais, Masoud Asadpour, Gilles Caprari, Jeanson, Rapha\"el, Anne Grimal, Guy Theraulaz. 2008. "The Embodiment of Cockroach Aggregation Behavior in a Group of Micro-robots." Artificial life, vol. 14, no. 4, pp. 387--408.
Simon J. Garnier, Jacques Gautrais, Guy Theraulaz. 2007. "The biological principles of swarm intelligence." Swarm Intelligence, vol. 1, no. 1, pp. 3--31.
Chapter
Simon J. Garnier, Christian Jost, Jeanson, Rapha\"el, Jacques Gautrais, Masoud Asadpour, Gilles Caprari, Guy Theraulaz. "Aggregation behaviour as a source of collective decision in a group of cockroach-like-robots." In Capcarr\`ere, Mathieu S; Freitas, Alex A; Bentley, Peter J; Johnson, Colin G; Timmis, Jon, eds., "Advances in Artificial Life," pp. 169--178. Springer Berlin Heidelberg, 2005.