anternet
nounUK /ˈæntəˌnɛt/ · US /ˈæn(t)ɚˌnɛt/
Etymology Blend of ant + internet. Coined by Balaji Prabhakar, a professor of electrical engineering and computer science at Stanford University.
1
No plural The means by which ants communicate with each other, analogous to the TCP/IP algorithm that the internet uses to control the flow of data.
- Long before researchers invented the Internet, ants invented something kind of like an anternet, and the two networks work pretty much the same way.2012, The Ant Internet, IEEE Spectrum
- 2013, Stanford course explores social networking in the 18th century – and in nature, Stanford News She and Balaji Prabhakar, a professor of electrical engineering and of computer science, last year published a paper showing that the ants' "anternet" algorithm follows the same rules as the protocols that regulate data traffic congestion on the Internet.