Authors:
Jorge Sousa
and
Ernesto Costa
Affiliation:
Centre of Informatics and Systems of the University of Coimbra, Portugal
Keyword(s):
Artificial life, Epigenetics, Regulation, Dynamic environments, Environmental influence.
Related
Ontology
Subjects/Areas/Topics:
Agent Models and Architectures
;
Agents
;
Artificial Intelligence
;
Artificial Intelligence and Decision Support Systems
;
Artificial Life
;
Computational Intelligence
;
Distributed and Mobile Software Systems
;
Enterprise Information Systems
;
Evolutionary Computing
;
Knowledge Engineering and Ontology Development
;
Knowledge-Based Systems
;
Multi-Agent Systems
;
Soft Computing
;
Software Engineering
;
Symbolic Systems
Abstract:
Neo-Darwinist concepts have always been questioned and, nowadays, one of the sources of debate is epigenetic theory. Epigenetics study the relation between phenotypes and their environment, and the way this relation can regulate the genetic expression, while producing traits that can be inherited by offspring. This work presents an Artificial Life model designed with epigenetic concepts of regulation and inheritance. A platform was developed, in order to study the evolutionary significance of the epigenetic phenomena, both at individual and population levels. Differences were observed in the evolutionary behavior of populations, regarding the epigenetic variants. Agents without epigenetic structures display difficulties thriving in dynamic environments, while epigenetic based agents are able to achieve regulation. It is also possible to observe the persistence of acquired traits during evolution, despite the absence of the signal that induces those same traits.