Design by morphogenesis

The process of morphogenesis is a natural example of genotype to phenotype mapping. As such it is relevant to evolutionary computation. A simulation o f morphogenesis and cell interaction is presented, which allows embryogenes is to be addressed as an engineering problem. A space of cell control funct ions is defined by identifying the controlling variables and the degrees of freedom of each individual cell. These functions receive inputs dependent on a cell's context, and determine its responses to that context. Multiple cells are coupled through a simulation of a 3-D reaction-diffusion fluid ma trix in order to generate interactive behaviour. The parameterised control function for the individual cells is tuned using a genetic algorithm to max imise the fitness of their collective behaviour. With use of an appropriate fitness function, the simulation is capable of producing the forms of earl y embryogenesis.