Transcript

Overview

This is a hand drawn comic with delicate line art, fully colored with markers, with text in a serif typeface. The first main character, Liz, is a young white woman with long brown hair wearing a green plaid shirt over a beige turtleneck tucked into high waisted trousers. She is wearing an old-fashioned pocket watch around her neck as a necklace. The second main character is a large black crow named Cordelia.

Cover

Flocking Birds and Active Matter

Artist: Madison Ellis

Researcher: Professor John Toner

Created through the University of Oregon Science and Comics Fellowship program.

ID: an evergreen forest with the silhouettes of a flock of birds flying above it.

Page 1

Panel 1: Liz stands in a forest looking at a flying flock of crows. She says, “Wow, it’s amazing to see all the birds flocking together.”

Panel 2: Liz is seen from Cordelia’s perspective as the bird flies above. Liz, with her hands cupped around her mouth: “Hey Cordelia!”

Panel 3: Cordelia, a large black crow, looks back at Liz “What can I help you with Miss Liz?”

Panel 4: Liz looks up at Cordelia, “How do birds manage to stay together like that when you fly?”

Panel 5: Cordelia perches on a stump, “Excellent question! We…”

Panel 6: Liz looks excited, her hands are surrounded by a sparkly orange glow, “is it MAGIC?”

Panel 7: Liz is in profile looking at her glowing hands.

Panel 8: Liz blows on her hands

Panel 9: A surprised beetle levitates, surrounded by the same orange glow.

Page 2

Panel 1: Cordelia addresses Liz, pointing a wing, “Actually Liz, it’s not magic, it’s SCIENCE.”

Panel 2: Liz looks skeptical, “Are you sure? You use magic as my familiar, are you sure you aren’t also using magic to flock?

Panel 3: Cordelia faces the read with her beak open, rolling her eyes, “Yes, I’m very sure.”

Panel 4-8: Cordelia: “Natural phenomena such as the flocking of birds, the herding of mammals, the schooling of fish, and the swarming of insects can be explained by exploring ACTIVE MATTER!” A flock of gulls fly together, two horned gazelles run, a school of fish circles, a swarm of bees fly.

Panel 8: Cordelia stands on the stump with her wings spread wide exclaiming “Active Matter!” The words are highlighted and surrounded by sparkles. In a secondary, inset panel, Liz looks confused. “Active matter? I don’t get it.”

Panel 9: Cordelia, in a caption: “Well let’s say I instruct a flock of birds to try to all point their beak in the same direction…” A flock of flamingos stand on a plain, facing different directions.

Panel 10: “and they are all standing in a foggy environment so that they can only see their four closest neighbors.” The flamingos are surrounded by fog. Five are visible, three more are only vague outlines in the fog.

Page 3

Page Description: The entire page is one image: Liz and Cordelia face the reader, a pocket watch hanging in front of them, dominating the page. The “tick tick tick tick” of the watch is written at the top of the page. Six additional panels are inlaid over the splash image. All text is in captions.

Panel 1: “Let’s say in this flock of birds,  everyone in the flock begins by pointing in the same direction, but one bird makes an error and points their beak 4 degrees off from the rest of the flock.”

An aerial view of four flamingos from above pointing straight ahead on a flat plane, labeled 0 degrees. The center flamingo is highlighted in green. Its head veers slightly right, labeled 4 degrees.

“*In a non-simulated situation, individual birds in the flock would also constantly be making errors of their own rather than just adjusting to the single original error.”

Panel 2: “Now if we were to tell them to look at their neighbors every second by the tick of your watch to readjust,” The sound effect ‘TICK’ is written over the heads of three flamingos drawn in profile. One flamingo is looking down at the other two.

Panel 3: “and this flamingo’s neighbors see that one of their fours neighbors is pointing 4 degrees off from their other three neighbors, they will point int the average of their neighbors adjusting their beaks to point 1 degree off.” In the ariel view, 3 flamingos point straight ahead (0 degrees) one flamingo points 4 degrees off course and another flamingo points 1 degree off course.

Panel 4: “the original error in turn changes their position to match the original direction of their four neighbors, correcting the original error.” In the ariel view, 4 flamingos now point 1 degree off and the center flamingo points 0  degrees off.

Panel 5: “Notice that after this first tick and readjustment, the error is still 4 degrees. The error of 4 degrees is conserved as it is very slowly spreading through the flock by diffusion.” There are two rows of five flamingos, each with an ‘error’ flamingo highlighted in the center. Between the two rows there is the large sound effect ‘TICK.’

Panel 6: “Because diffusion is such a slow process, and errors decay slower in lower dimensions, the birds will not be able to all point in the same direction.” In the dense fog there are several flamingo heads, all pointing in different directions. The pocket watch hangs in the center of the panel, ticking.

Page 4

Panel 1: Cordelia’s head is in profile, with her word balloon and the text ‘3D’ in big block levels over her head. “But, they can all point in the same direction in a 3-dimensional  space!”

Panel 2: “Now, if I were to recreate the previous experiment, but instead the flock of birds were situated in the 3D environment of a tree…they would all be able to point their beaks in the same direction! A flock of flamingos sits in a tree at different heights. Arrows show that their beaks are all pointed down at the same angle.

Panel 3: A close-up on Liz, confused. “What?! How?”

Panel 4: In the panel directly below Liz in panel 3, Cordelia looks up at Liz. “…Just listen.”

Panel 5: Foregrounded is a drawing of a flamingo wearing 3-D glasses, labeled 3D. Behind is a flat drawing of a flamingo, labeled 2D. Cordelia: “An error spreads through the flock slower in 2D than in 3D, meaning the birds are able to get rid of the error more efficiently in 3D.

Panel 6: An ariel view of a single flamingo, slightly off course, on an X Y axis. Cordelia: “For example, if we wait 100 ticks in the 2D configuration, the error has spread out a distance of ten, meaning there are 100 pointers each making 1/100 of the error.

Panel 7: Zooming in on the flamingos in the tree, one flamingo is highlighted and labeled with X, Y, and Z axes. “In contrast if we wait 100 ticks in the 3D configuration, the error has still spread a distance of ten, but because of the additional dimension it can move in, there are now 1000 pointers each making 1/1000 of the original error.”

Panel 8: a flock of flamingos all point in the same direction, “Because they spread the error to their neighbors faster, the error falls off quicker within the flock, allowing them to eventually all point in the same direction.”

Page 5

Panel 1: Cordelia perches on Liz’s shoulder. Liz: “That’s cool and all, but what about flocking?” Cordelia: “Well, what’s interesting about flocking is that while a group of birds couldn’t all point in the same direction on a 2D plane, they can all move in the same direction!”

Panel 2: “And the reason they can accomplish this is because they are in motion. As a result of their motion the error spreads much faster than diffusion allows for.” A flamingo holding a flag that reads “Movers” rides on the back of a cheetah. Behind the cheetah, a flamingo with a flag that reads “pointers” sits on a tortoise’s back.

Panel 3: Liz stands at a kitchen counter. Her right hand points at a mug. Both the hand and the mug glow with magic. The sound effect ‘POOF’ is in a cloud over her head. Cordelia, sitting on the counter: “It’s like when you stir your coffee after you add milk.”

Panel 4: “The motion of the stir, even if this motion is slow, still mixes the two liquids faster than diffusion…” Two clear mugs of coffee sit on the counter. In the mug with a spoon labeled “stir,” the milk is evenly mixed into the coffee making it light brown. The second mug, labeled “diffusion” has dark and light areas where milk hasn’t been fully incorporated.

Panel 5: “…in the same way the movement of the flock spreads the error faster than diffusion.” A flock of flamingo flies.

Panel 6: “Also interesting is that in this moving flock, the error will spread much more rapidly perpendicular to the forward movement of the flock.” Cordelia spreads her wings while talking and four arrows like the axes of a 2-D graph point out from her head.

Panel 7: “Poof” Liz and Cordelia are transported to theater seats; flamingos sit in the seats around them.

Page 6

Panel 1: Liz looks around the theatre seats, “Wow! Where are we?” Cordelia responds, “Just watch.”

Panel 2: A toucan stands at a podium on stage. The podium has a sign that says “Flock Faceoff.” Behind the podium is part of a larger version of this sign, ringed in lights. The Toucan: “Hello everyone and welcome to Flock Faceoff! Today we have a very exciting match-up for you all…”

Panel 3: A wide view of the entire stage. Two podiums are on either side of the Toucan. The green podium is labeled “Convection,” and the purple podium is labeled “Diffusion.” A flamingo stands behind each podium. The Toucan: “It’s convection vs. diffusion in a thrilling race to see who can spread the error through their flock the fastest!”

Panel 4: “Playing for the green team we have convection.” A close up on the convection podium.

Panel 5: “and over on the purple team we have diffusion!” The diffusion flamingo raises its wing.

Page 7

Panel 1: The Toucan raises a wing, “All right contestants, each of you has a flock through which you will be trying to spread your message, so go take your places!”

Panel 2: A wide view of the stage and the flamingos in the audience. In the center, the convection flamingo spreads its wings and takes off. Toucan “Whoever spreads their message the fastest will be today’s big winner!”

Panel 3-5: A close up on the Toucan speaking into its mic, “On your marks…” Liz and Cordelia look at the stage. “Get set…” The Toucan spreads its wings, “Fly!”

Panel 6-8: “The green [convection] bird is moving slightly off from the forward motion of their flock, so they are constantly drifting past other birds, thus spreading the error to those they pass.” The panels show a green highlighted flamingo drifting off course down through a flock of flying flamingos. As it drifts past more and more flamingos near them are highlighted in yellow, showing how the error spreads.

Page 8

Panel 1: “As a result, the cloud of information being spread grows perpendicular to the forward motion of the flock because the green bird is able to spread the error convectively to those on their right and left.” Flamingos are represented by an array of pink dots, the dots in a horizontal strip in the center are green and a double-sided arrow runs vertically though the panel.

Panel 2: “The green bird’s forward and backwards motion is still about the same as everyone else’s, so the message still spreads diffusively in those directions.” The green flamingo flies between two other flamingos.

Panel 3: “The purple [diffusion] bird, however, is left spreading the message by word of mouth.” The purple flamingo shades its beak with its wing to whisper in another bird’s ear.

Panel 4: “They can share the message to their neighbors,” two pink flamingos whisper in their neighbor’s ears, the purple flamingo stands between them.

Panel 5: “but since they are not passing other flock members, they are only able to share with their neighbors, so the spread of information is much slower.” An arial view of the flamingos standing in concentric circles with the purple flamingo in the center and the message spreading outward.

Panel 6: A flamingo wearing a tricorne hat rides a horse down a dirt road past a flamingo in a white cap. “Think of Paul Revere. He would have not been able to spread his message as quickly if he were spreading it by word of mouth rather than riding through town, right?”

Panel 7: A close up on the Toucan, “Well folks it looks like we have a winner! In first place…”

Panel 8: Confetti falls as the Toucan shakes the convection flamingo’s wing, “it’s team convection!”

Panel 9: The two flamingos stand on first and second place podiums.

Page 9

Panel 1: Liz reappears standing in the forest, the sound effect ‘POOF’ above her head. Cordelia sits in a tree next to her. Liz: “Whoa!”

Panel 2: Liz looks up at flock of crows flying, “Wow, you birds really are amazing, I can’t believe I’d never heard of active matter before.”

Panel 3: Liz looks at Cordelia, “thanks for teaching me.”

Panel 4: Cordelia: “Of course Miss Liz I’m always happy to help.”

Panel 5: “Now if you don’t mind, I have a flock of my own that I’d like to get back to.”

Panel 6: Cordelia flies up toward her flock of crows.

Panel 7: Liz is seen from above, shouting up to Cordelia, “See you later Cordelia!”

Panel 8: Liz looks up at Cordelia’s flock. Sparkling letters the orange color of Liz’s magic spell out ‘END.’