Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

Giovanni Reina @joefresna.bsky.social · 28d

Wonderful time & great connections last week in Siena 🇮🇹🍝🍷 for #CCS2025
Brilliant experience for my team, who presented 5 exciting projects in various formats, and amazing feedback from the community ♥️ who awarded Simay Atasoy the Best Poster.
Looking forward to #CCS2026 😎
@css-conference.bsky.social

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Giovanni Reina @joefresna.bsky.social · Sep 1

Hey #CCS2025 friends, before your dinner🍝 in Siena, come to Simay Atasoy's poster to discover how many robots can be optimimally allocated to many tasks! While this problem seems computationally untractable, she found how to solve it efficiently! @cbehav.bsky.social @css-conference.bsky.social

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Giovanni Reina @joefresna.bsky.social · Sep 1

Full room for Eleonora Gatti's talk at @css-conference.bsky.social, presenting our analysis on the energetic benefits of using social information, in the case study of large soaring birds 🦅 @cbehav.bsky.social #CCS2025 Siena 🇮🇹

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Giovanni Reina @joefresna.bsky.social · Sep 1

From Random Notes to Emergent Orchestras.
Lluc Bono presents at @css-conference.bsky.social our latest results on creating a robot swarm that composes & performs musical pieces. A framework to study emergence of creativity in music through artificial physical agents @cbehav.bsky.social #CCS2025

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Giovanni Reina @joefresna.bsky.social · Sep 1

After two great opening keynotes at @css-conference.bsky.social, my students @nomaanhusain.bsky.social and Sindiso Mkhatshwa present their research in lightening plenary talks. #swarmRobotics #collectiveBehaviour #CCS2025 @cbehav.bsky.social Siena 🇮🇹

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Giovanni Reina @joefresna.bsky.social · Aug 14

A very long article—or a short book—on animate matter, what are the current challenges and future technologies that can unlock the huge potential of animate materials? Check out doi.org/10.1088/1361... which includes a piece by @vitotrianni.bsky.social and me on #swarmRobotics

Roadmap for animate matter - IOPscience

Roadmap for animate matter, Volpe, Giorgio, Araújo, Nuno A M, Guix, Maria, Miodownik, Mark, Martin, Nicolas, Alvarez, Laura, Simmchen, Juliane, Leonardo, Roberto Di, Pellicciotta, Nicola, Martinet, Qu...

doi.org

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Reposted by Giovanni Reina

Pranav Kedia @praked.bsky.social · Aug 1

Last month I pitched @fallingwallslabdk.bsky.social BW at @uni-konstanz.de 🚀
Shared my project SailSwarm — tiny wind-powered robots reimagining ocean monitoring 🌊🤖
Big ideas, 3-min limits, and a room full of future-shapers. What a ride! #FallingWallsLab #SailSwarm #SciComm #OceanTech

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Giovanni Reina @joefresna.bsky.social · Jul 29

Autonomous sailboats? Check. Lecture? Check. Boat-on-stage entrance? @praked.bsky.social stole the show at #KSCB2025. 😎⛵

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Reposted by Giovanni Reina

Michal Pluhacek @mpluhacek.bsky.social · Jul 18

Super excited to announce that my work with @joefresna.bsky.social and @lostintheswarm.bsky.social has just been published in the Swarm Intelligence journal. We show how a swarm of minimalistic robots can self-localize and construct a global coordinate system.
link.springer.com/article/10.1...

Decentralised construction of a global coordinate system in a large swarm of minimalistic robots - Swarm Intelligence

Collective intelligence and autonomy of robot swarms can be improved by enabling individual robots to become aware that they are the constituent parts of a larger whole and to identify their role with...

link.springer.com

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Reposted by Giovanni Reina

ANTS 2026 @ants2026.bsky.social · Jun 13

First Call for Papers - ANTS 2026
Darmstadt, Germany | June 8–10, 2026
ants2026.org

The 15th International Conference on Swarm Intelligence invites submissions on the theme:

"Reaching beyond – swarm intelligence across systems, disciplines, and communities".

🗓️ Submission deadline: 10 Nov 2025

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Reposted by Giovanni Reina

Orit Peleg @oritpeleg.bsky.social · Jul 3

📣 We're on the lookout for a creative postdoc with strong computational skills!

Be the go-to person in the lab for building simple but powerful simulations that test wild ideas on biological rythems: from daily cycles of mussel groups at deep sea, to firefly flash synchronization!

More info below👇

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Giovanni Reina @joefresna.bsky.social · Jun 23

Attending #DAWO25 -the European DAO Workshop- in Zurich.
Amazed to find aims, principles, & philosophy identical to the anarchism workshop attended last month. The only difference here are shirts & tailleurs rather than hollow jumpers...
Same focus on scalable consensus & self-organised governance

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Giovanni Reina @joefresna.bsky.social · Jun 23

A weekend on the other lake...
together with my frisbee friends 🥏
#lakeComo
#ultimateFrisbee #frasbadallac

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Reposted by Giovanni Reina

Narcís Font-Massot @narcisfontmassot.bsky.social · Jun 6

My first co-author paper is out in Current Biology!

In this study, led by Daniela Perez and Serena Ding, we show that nematode self-assembling towers occur in nature and can serve as a collective dispersal mechanism 🪱

Check out a video where Daniela explains the findings and the paper here 👇

Max Planck Institute of Animal Behavior @mpi-animalbehav.bsky.social · Jun 5

Move over, starling murmurations. There’s a slimier, squirmier collective behavior in town. It's a living, twisting tower of worms.

Everybody, meet the wormuration 🪱🪱

Latest paper by Daniela Perez, Serena Ding and team @uni-konstanz.de

Paper: doi.org/10.1016/j.cu...

youtube.com/shorts/F8QVc...

Have you ever seen a worm tower?

YouTube video by Max Planck Institute of Animal Behavior

youtube.com

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Reposted by Giovanni Reina

Andrew King @shoalgroup.bsky.social · Jun 3

1/3

www.swansea.ac.uk/postgraduate...

PhD studentship! Comparative Analysis and Modelling of Collective Behaviour in Natural and Artificial Systems.

**this scholarship for UK residents only, as defined by UKCISA regulations**

Details below! Please RT

(AI-generated image)

AI generated image showing flock of sheep, shoal of fish, flock of birds and swarm robots

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Reposted by Giovanni Reina

Carlo Pinciroli @carlo.pinciroli.net · Jun 2

It was a blast to visit the @cbehav.bsky.social ! I am impressed by their concentration of talent and creativity.

I am also grateful for the warm hospitality of @swarmdynamics.bsky.social and @joefresna.bsky.social, who made this day even more special!

Let's write a paper already :-)

Giovanni Reina @joefresna.bsky.social · Jun 2

Very happy to welcome a good friend @carlo.pinciroli.net in the wonderful Konstanz to speak about cool science for a couple of days! Hopefully, these meetings will trigger some fun collaboration!

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Giovanni Reina @joefresna.bsky.social · Jun 2

Very happy to welcome a good friend @carlo.pinciroli.net in the wonderful Konstanz to speak about cool science for a couple of days! Hopefully, these meetings will trigger some fun collaboration!

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Giovanni Reina @joefresna.bsky.social · May 28

Congratulations to Stef Van Havermaet on successfully defending his PhD thesis on robot swarms for fish 🐟 conservation!
Thank you to UGent for inviting me to serve as an external examiner in the wonderful city of Ghent, and making it possible to reconnect with old friends and colleagues.

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Reposted by Giovanni Reina

ANTS 2026 @ants2026.bsky.social · May 19

We are excited to announce that the Fifteenth International Conference on Swarm Intelligence (ANTS 2026) will be taking place on June 8-10, 2026 in Darmstadt, Germany.

📅 Submissions: Nov 10, 2025
📅 Notification: Jan 30, 2026
📅 Conference: June 8-10, 2026
🌐 ants2026.org

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Reposted by Giovanni Reina

Max Planck Institute of Animal Behavior @mpi-animalbehav.bsky.social · May 20

Royal Society has elected @icouzin.bsky.social as a Fellow in recognition of contributions to research on animal collectives 🐟🦗🦈🐜

Congratulations to Max Planck Director and Prof @cbehav.bsky.social @uni-konstanz.de, Iain Couzin FRS!

@royalsociety.org @maxplanck.de

www.ab.mpg.de/679766/news_...

Iain Couzin elected Fellow of the Royal Society

In recognition of his outstanding contributions to research on animal collectives, the Royal Society has elected behavioural biologist Iain Couzin as Fellow.

www.ab.mpg.de

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Giovanni Reina @joefresna.bsky.social · May 26

A good day catching up with former colleagues from the IRIDIA Lab at @ulbruxelles.bsky.social, their work in #SwarmRobotics continues to impress, now enriched with #RL, #LLM, and #DAO 🤖

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Giovanni Reina @joefresna.bsky.social · May 22

Today, German Science Foundation @dfg.de decided to shut down the most vibrant, inspiring, and successful scientific community I’ve been part of!
@cbehav.bsky.social fostered groundbreaking interdisciplinary research in #collectiveBehavior. Its closure is a loss for science in Germany and beyond 🕯️🌑

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Reposted by Giovanni Reina

Universität Konstanz @uni-konstanz.de · May 20

The @royalsociety.org has elected behavioural biologist @icouzin.bsky.social as Fellow. Couzin is Speaker of the #UniKonstanz Cluster of Excellence @cbehav.bsky.social and Professor at the University of Konstanz, as well as Director at the @mpi-animalbehav.bsky.social. Full story: t1p.de/ap3uw

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Giovanni Reina @joefresna.bsky.social · May 21

Together with Alex Pacheco, we are presenting Swarms Robotics as a possible form of Anarchism, where the robot society self-organises into an efficient collective despite of (or thanks! to) the absence of a supervising leader. Interesting discussions coming up...

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Giovanni Reina @joefresna.bsky.social · May 21

Today I'm attending Complex Anarchism Symposium.
Quite a different setup from traditional conferences...
Fully self-organised, sleeping in tents, with energy circles and support angels 🪽
Love it!

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