Growing Digital Leaves by Vascular Network Optimization

The explanation of structures observed in nature, like the leaf, has long been the goal of mathematicians. Growing life forms from first principles is a computing task outside the realm of supercomputers and will remain so into the foreseeable future. However, it is still possible to model them by incorporating what we understand of the principles that guide their formation. This paper builds on the work of Qinglan Xia [1], who was the first to present leaf growth in this cost-functional formulation and whose results I try to replicate.