HomeRobotics & KinematicsStigmergic Swarm Construction

Stigmergic Swarm Construction (2D)

2D top-down stigmergic swarm-construction simulator: simple robots sense only their immediate neighbouring grid cells, place blocks by a local response-threshold rule with no map and no robot-to-robot communication, and towers emerge purely from the shared, decaying pheromone field they leave behind.

Robotics & Kinematics2DModerate60 FPS📱 Mobile-adapted⇄ 3D version
2d-swarm-robotics-stigmergy-construction ↗ Open standalone

This top-down version makes the "no map, no radio" claim easy to check with your own eyes: each robot's whole world is the cell it is standing on and its four immediate neighbours. It reads the local pheromone level, runs it through a response-threshold rule, and either places a block or doesn't — that single local decision, repeated by every robot independently, is the entire construction program. Placing a block deposits more pheromone on that cell, so the next robot to wander past is more likely to build there too, and that closed loop of build → deposit → sense → build again is what turns a flat empty grid into a field of discrete towers with zero central planning. Hit "New random start" to reseed the colony with a different robot count and different starting positions — the local rule is unchanged, and the towers that grow back settle into the same characteristic spacing and height distribution every time, which is the hallmark of genuine stigmergic self-organization rather than a scripted layout.

⚙ Under the hood

A leaderless swarm of robots builds towers on a grid by sensing a decaying, diffusing pheromone field and applying a response-threshold build rule — each placed block deposits more pheromone, closing the classic stigmergy feedback loop behind termite mounds and swarm-construction robotics.

swarm roboticsstigmergypheromone fieldself-organizationreaction-diffusiontermite mound

2D · HTML5 Canvas 2D · 60 FPS target · runs fully client-side, no install

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