---
title: "Slime mould · Animals and other organisms · Entities · Simulation Hypothesis"
url: https://simulation-hypothesis.com/entities/physarum
description: "A single giant cell with no neurons. It solves mazes and grows efficient transport networks."
license: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
credit: "Ross Allan Dahl, Simulation Hypothesis (simulation-hypothesis.com)"
---

[Entities](https://simulation-hypothesis.com/entities) › Animals and other organisms › No neurons

# Slime mould

Physarum polycephalum

A single giant cell with no neurons. It solves mazes and grows efficient transport networks.

Neurons

0 measured  · no neurons (single giant multinucleate cell)

## Evidence

* An amoeboid plasmodium found the shortest path through a maze.  
Nakagaki T, Yamada H, Toth A (2000) Maze-solving by an amoeboid organism. Nature 407(6803):470\. doi:10.1038/35035159.
* Its network of tubes organises itself. Its cost, efficiency and fault tolerance are comparable to the Tokyo rail network.  
Tero A, Takagi S, Saigusa T, Ito K, Bebber DP, Fricker MD, Yumiki K, Kobayashi R, Nakagaki T (2010) Rules for biologically inspired adaptive network design. Science 327(5964):439-442\. doi:10.1126/science.1177894.

Assess it against the published criteria