Reaction-diffusion and ant-based load balancing of communication networks

Attempts to characterise some aspects of the new wave of reaction-diffusion and ant based computation, and to discuss their place in the class of fully distributed load-balancing algorithms that solve the dynamic load-balancing problem of communication networks. The main question of the paper states: what are the advantages of the intellectualisation of the control agents and what are the costs of smartness? We start our investigation with random walk techniques and the electricity paradigm, carry on with the reaction-diffusion approach, and finish the construction of the computational hierarchy with the ant paradigm and smart agents.