Dr. Thorsten Kimmeskamp from the Faculty of Computer Science’s mentoring program and Kaan Demir, a student in the Faculty of Computer Science, explained the interactive computer science experiment “digital firefly swarm” to participants at the Extraschicht event. 

The experiment draws on a fascinating phenomenon from nature: Some species of fireflies are able to synchronize their light signals with one another, and thousands of fireflies eventually flash in unison at the same rhythm. This behavior can be replicated in a distributed system using simple algorithms.

Using the digital firefly swarm, visitors were able to experience how a coordinated overall system emerges from many individual, independently acting units. The experiment illustrates fundamental concepts of computer science in a playful way.