双语：向蜜蜂学习或可解决堵车问题

屈联西

  2010年10月28日环球时报


　　According to the Ahmedabad Mirror of October 27, British scientists have discovered that bees learn to fly the shortest possible route between flowers even if they discover the flowers in a different order。
　　The bees are the first animals found to solve "travelling salesman problems"。
　　The travelling salesman must find the shortest route that allows him to visit all locations on his route. Computers solve it by comparing the length of all possible routes and choosing the shortest. However, bees solve it without computer assistance using a brain the size of grass seed。
　　Nigel Raine, from the School of Biological Sciences at Royal Holloway explains: "Foraging bees solve travelling salesman problems every day. They visit flowers at multiple locations and, because bees use lots of energy to fly, they find a route which keeps flying to a minimum."
　　As well as enhancing our understanding of how bees move around the landscape pollinating crops and wild flowers, this research, has other applications. Our lifestyle relies on networks such as traffic on the roads, information flow on the Web and business supply chains。
　　By understanding how bees can solve their problem we can improve our management of these everyday networks without needing lots of computer time。
　　据国外网站"Ahmedabad Mirror"10月27日报道，英国科学家发现，尽管花的分布位置不同，蜜蜂总是能够在所有飞行路径中找到最短的那条。
　　迄今为止，蜜蜂是唯一能够解决“旅行销售者问题”的动物。
　　销售员在拜访多个地点的时候要寻求一条最短的路径。计算机将所有可能路径进行比较以后，然后选择一条最短路径。蜜蜂的大脑只有草籽一般大，也没有电脑的帮助，但是却已经找到解决的方法。
　　英国皇家霍洛韦生物科学学院研究人员奈杰尔•雷恩说：“蜜蜂每天都在花丛中飞来飞去，为了采蜜进行飞行是一件很耗精力的事情，所以它们要将飞行控制在最短的距离。因此实际上蜜蜂每天都在解决“旅行销售员问题”。
　　除了加深我们理解蜜蜂如何在田野中飞行以及对农作物和野花进行授粉外，研究还可以应用在其他领域。我们的生活在很大程度上是依赖“网络”的，如公路上的交通、互联网上的信息交流以及商业供应链。
　　通过了解蜜蜂是如何解决它们的问题，我们既不用借用电脑的帮助，又可以提高管理日常“网络”工作效率。