Collective Decisions in Animals and Robots

This project will study mechanisms for making effective collective group decisions to achieve goals that are embedded in space, drawing on inspiration from animal behaviour and neuroscience to design algorithms for robots.

How groups should make decisions and coordinate their behaviour is a fundamental problem for animals, from starling flocks to foraging social insect colonies. Over the last two decades our understanding of the mechanisms that give rise to sophisticated coordinated behaviour using only simple rules acting on local information has advanced substantially, using a variety of cutting edge technologies, and shown parallels between how individual brains implement behaviour, and how animal groups can do the same.

This project will seek to use and contribute to the theory of collective animal behaviour, and its links with neuroscience, to explore the space of controllers for simple collective robots. The project will have access to a cutting-edge augmented reality system for collective robotics, allowing sophisticated experiments with hundreds of robots.

Supervisor Bio

Prof James Marshall is Director of the Centre for Machine Intelligence at the University of Sheffield, and Founder Science Officer at Opteran, a breakthrough deep tech spinout aiming to bring a fundamental understanding of animal behaviour and brains to the design of software for robots and autonomous systems.

About the Department/Research Group

Supported by a multi-million pound investment from the University of Sheffield, the Centre for Machine Intelligence is a strategic initiative dedicated to the transformation and acceleration of our research, innovation and teaching via Artificial Intelligence (AI).

99 percent of our research is rated in the highest two categories in the REF 2021, meaning it is classed as world-leading or internationally excellent. We are rated as 8th nationally for the quality of our research environment, showing that the Department of Computer Science is a vibrant and progressive place to undertake research.

Candidate Requirements

-Masters degree in a science or engineering field, especially computer science, mathematics, physics, or neuroscience (2(i) / Merit or higher)

-An interest in animal behaviour / computational neuroscience, and robotics

-Evidence of interest in academic research beneficial

-If English is not your first language, you must have an IELTS score of 6.5 overall, with no less than 6.0 in each component.

How to Apply

To apply for a PhD studentship, applications must be made directly to the University of Sheffield using the Postgraduate Online Application Form. Make sure you name Professor James Marshall as your proposed supervisor.

Information on what documents are required and a link to the application form can be found here – https://www.sheffield.ac.uk/postgraduate/phd/apply/applying 

The form has comprehensive instructions for you to follow, and pop-up help is available. 

Your research proposal should:

-be no longer than 4 A4 pages, include references

-outline your reasons for applying for this studentship

-explain how you would approach the research, including details of your skills and experience in the topic area