關(guān)于交通堵塞，螞蟻能教會我們什么

關(guān)于交通堵塞，螞蟻能教會我們什么

You have to admire the grace of ants on the move. No matter how many of them are streaming toward their destination, there's never a hold up. No fender benders. And, unlike humans, they know how to pull off a proper lane merge.

你不得不佩服螞蟻移動的優(yōu)雅。不管有多少人涌向目的地，都不會有延誤。沒有防撞彎管機。而且，與人類不同的是，它們知道如何進行正確的車道合并。

No matter how many ants share the road, their progress is always steady. (Photo: wan azizi/Shutterstock)

A new research paper published this week in the journal eLife reveals how ants keep traffic flowing by changing their behavior to meet changing conditions.

本周發(fā)表在《生命》雜志上的一篇新研究論文揭示了螞蟻如何通過改變自己的行為來滿足不斷變化的條件來保持交通暢通。

If traffic is at a trickle, for instance, ants will space themselves out and behave more individualistically. But when it's bumper-to-bumper — or in this case, antennae-to-abdomen — they coalesce into a single stream that just keeps flowing.

例如，如果交通流量是涓涓細(xì)流，螞蟻就會把自己隔開，表現(xiàn)得更有個性。但是，當(dāng)它的保險杠到保險杠，或者在這個例子中，天線到腹部，它們合并成一個單一的流，只是繼續(xù)流動。

Tapping into the Argentine ants' knack for fast commutes, the researchers built bridges connecting their colonies. The bridges varied in width from a fifth to three-quarters of an inch. The colonies, too, were of different sizes, ranging from 400 to more than 25,000 ants.

利用阿根廷螞蟻快速通勤的本領(lǐng)，研究人員建造了連接它們的蟻群的橋梁。橋的寬度從五分之一英寸到四分之三英寸不等。蟻群大小不一，從400只到25000多只不等。

Essentially, researchers built a new infrastructure system for the ants, connecting their biggest cities to the smallest hamlets. Then they sat back and monitored the traffic.

本質(zhì)上，研究人員為螞蟻建立了一個新的基礎(chǔ)設(shè)施系統(tǒng)，將它們最大的城市與最小的村莊連接起來。然后他們坐下來監(jiān)視交通。

And surprise, surprise, even when those narrower bridges reached near-capacity, there were no 20-ant pile-ups. Indeed, there was nary a fender-bender.

令人驚訝的是，即使那些更窄的橋梁達到接近承載能力，也沒有20只螞蟻堆積。的確，沒有發(fā)生任何小事故。

Traffic remained steady regardless of how overburdened the infrastructure because they were able to adjust to the ebb and flow of road conditions. At some point, when the bridges got really busy, ants moved not so much as individuals but rather like water flowing in an ever-constant stream.

交通保持穩(wěn)定，不管基礎(chǔ)設(shè)施負(fù)擔(dān)如何沉重，因為他們能夠適應(yīng)道路狀況的起伏。在某一時刻，當(dāng)橋梁變得非常繁忙時，螞蟻的移動不像單個螞蟻那樣頻繁，而是像一條永不停歇的溪流。

The lesson for humans? The traffic conundrum — one of modern life's seemingly unsolvable puzzles — may lie in our inability to adjust our driving habits for the good of the whole. You've probably noticed it on your own commute to work. Driving is fun when there are few cars on the road — a lane-change here, a little acceleration there. Then traffic slows to a crawl. And yet, some impatient driver still acts like he's alone on the road, tailgating and constantly jockeying between lanes. It doesn't buy that driver any more time, but instead further entangles traffic.

對人類的教訓(xùn)?交通難題——現(xiàn)代生活中看似無法解決的難題之一——可能在于我們無法為了整體的利益而調(diào)整我們的駕駛習(xí)慣。你可能在上班的路上就注意到了。當(dāng)路上的車很少的時候，開車是很有趣的——這里換道，那里加速。然后交通變得緩慢。然而，一些沒有耐心的司機仍然表現(xiàn)得像一個人在路上，緊跟在后面，不斷地在車道之間打轉(zhuǎn)。它不再為那個司機爭取更多的時間，反而使交通更加混亂。

We are not ants, but we could learn a thing or two from their traffic management skills. (Photo: Scott Olson/Getty Images)

The research also suggests that infrastructure projects, like the ever-widening of highways, may never free us from the plague of traffic jams. As long as we motor along with our own agendas, no matter how many other people are on the road, we'll always end up in a traffic snarl.

研究還表明，基礎(chǔ)設(shè)施項目，比如高速公路的不斷拓寬，可能永遠(yuǎn)無法讓我們擺脫交通堵塞的困擾。只要我們按照自己的計劃開車，不管路上有多少人，我們最終都會陷入交通混亂。

Indeed, less space may actually be a good thing. It leaves less room for individual choice and forces us to take a page from the driving manual of ants.

實際上，更少的空間可能是一件好事。這就減少了個體選擇的空間，迫使我們不得不從螞蟻的駕駛手冊中學(xué)習(xí)一頁。