Computing with the actin-myosin molecular motor system

We propose a new, biologically-inspired model of computation, based on the motion of actin filaments on a myosin substrate, as used in motility assays, noting that this represents a marriage of the fields of natural computing and computing with agents. A highly simplified model of actin motility is presented and used to simulate the simultaneous motion of identical filaments. We show that using some simple formal definitions, we can regard this motion as a continuous computation. We demonstrate using a computer simulation, how actin filaments can be used to solve a traditional maze in a highly parallel fashion, with obvious implications for attacking computationally difficult graph problems. Briefly, we mention the limitations of our model and possibilities for the physical implementation of such a system.