Slime moulds make intelligent decisions without a brain

Slime moulds can find their way through complex environments and adapt to changing conditions, despite lacking a brain. A new study offers an explanation that connects the organism's movement and internal processes into a unified whole. Scientists are investigating whether such behaviour is purely physics or something more.

Slime moulds are among nature's most mysterious organisms. Outwardly they appear as simple slimy formations, yet their behaviour has repeatedly astounded scientists. Although they lack a brain or nervous system, these organisms can move through complex environments and make decisions that resemble intelligent behaviour.

Study explains the mechanism of behaviour

A new study offers an intriguing explanation for this phenomenon, linking the organism's movement and internal biochemical processes into a unified whole. According to the scientists' hypothesis, slime moulds' decision-making process may be explained through physical laws, without needing to assume anything resembling classical intelligence.

Slime moulds can, for example, find the shortest path to food through a maze and adjust their movement trajectory in response to environmental changes. It is precisely this food-seeking behaviour that has particularly captured scientists' attention, since it strongly resembles rational planning.

Physics or something more?

The key question that scientists are seeking to answer is whether such behaviour can be fully explained by physics-for instance, through pressure and flow patterns within the organism-or whether it is something fundamentally different and harder to explain. The results of the new study suggest that movement and internal processes are closely connected and continuously shape one another.

The study of slime moulds is also important for scientists more broadly, as it helps us understand how complex behaviour can emerge without a central nervous system, a question with significance in both biology and artificial intelligence development.