Pheromone model: Application to traffic congestion prediction

Social insects perform complex tasks without top-down style control, by sensing and depositing chemical markers called "pheromone". We have examined applications of this pheromone paradigm towards intelligent transportation systems (ITS). Many of the current traffic management approaches require central processing with the usual risk for overload, bottlenecks and delays. Our work points towards a more decentralized approach that may overcome those risks. In this paper, a car is regarded as a social insect that deposits (electronic) pheromone on the road network. The pheromone represents density of traffic. We propose a method to predict traffic congestion of the immediate future through a pheromone mechanism without resorting to the use of a traffic control center. We evaluate our method using a simulation based on real-world traffic data and the results indicate applicability to prediction of immediate future traffic congestion. Furthermore, we describe the relationship between pheromone parameters and accuracy of prediction.