Self-organizing systems, such as aqueous surfactant solutions forming vesicles and other microscopic structures, provide insights into complex biological architectures. Myelin figures, formed by the self-assembly of amphiphilic molecules around oil droplets, resemble structures found in biological systems, specifically myelin sheaths around nerve fibers. This study investigates the formation of myelin figures in a decanol-sodium decanoate system using polarized optical microscopy. The system's simplicity allows for the exploration of emergent behaviour, akin to biological processes. By varying parameters such as pH and salt concentration, the morphology and growth of myelin figures and anisotropy evolution are examined. Understanding the mechanisms driving myelin figure formation provides fundamental knowledge applicable to wet artificial life research. Insights gained from this study contribute to our understanding of self-organization and emergent behaviour in complex systems, offering potential applications in drug delivery, materials science, and biomedical research. Furthermore, the study sheds light on the parallels between artificial systems and biological processes, enhancing our understanding of both. Through interdisciplinary approaches, such as those employed in this study, we can uncover the intricate interplay between chemical systems and biological phenomena, paving the way for innovative solutions in artificial life research and beyond.

The theme of ALIFE 2021 conference is ”Robots: The century past and the century ahead” , because we celebrate the centenary of Čapek's R.U.R. and the worldwide-used word “robot” , which comes from this play. The conference was originally scheduled to be held in Prague, the city where the play had its official world premiere in 1921. However, because of the covid-19 pandemic and its repercussions, ALIFE 2021 conference is virtual. Nevertheless, in this introductory paper the history of the R.U.R. play and its plot are briefly outlined and its legacy to current research discussed, namely in the context of the field of artificial life.

Collective behavior, swarming and mutual interactions between living entities are well-known phenomena in biology where, for example, flocks of birds or schools of fish are extensively studied. Swarming has also been observed in bacteria or tumor cell populations. This kind of collective behavior can be implemented also in non-living systems, namely in biologically-inspired swarm robotics. However, the collective behavior of chemical droplets (mutual interactions of multiple “liquid robots”) has not been studied before and the present paper reports the experimentally observed phenomena and modes of behavior in such system. We show how multiple decanol droplets in a thin layer of decanoate solution behave and interact. We report, for the first time, several life-like features such as collective chemotaxis and number-dependent group formation.