Fruit Fly Brains Inform Search Engines of the Future
November 9, 2017
Now, Salk and University of California San Diego scientists have discovered that the fruit fly brain has an elegant and efficient method of performing similarity searches. For flies, it helps them identify odors that are most similar to those they’ve encountered before, so they know how to behave in response to the odor, such as to approach or avoid it. New details on the fly’s computational approach to smelly similarity searches, described in the journal Science on November 9, 2017, could inform computer algorithms of the future.
