BIOLOGICAL SIMULATIONS BY AUTONOMOUS AGENTS: TWO EXAMPLES USING THE NETLOGO ENVIRONMENT.

Simulation of complex biological events by autonomous agents is particularly conve- nient whenever: i) the events depend on both time and space, and ii) some collective, organized trends emerge at the population level from a few simple properties charac- terizing each single agent. This has been exemplied by simulating two quite dierent phenomena, namely: i) the distribution of cod populations in the North Atlantic ocean, and ii) the synchronous activation of brain neurons occurring in many neurological dis- orders, including epyleptic seizures. In both cases simulations of the observed time dependent trends, although qualita- tive,provided hints to work out relevant mechanistic hypotheses.