A Novel Developmental System for the Study of Evolutionary Design

A novel developmental system designed to facilitate the study of generative encoding-based evolutionary design is presented. An aim of this work is to explore the simplest system and genetic encoding capable of exhibiting phenomena akin to size regulation and self-repair in developmental biology. Here we show that in the absence of complicated developmental mechanisms such as ligand-receptor mediated cell signaling, asymmetric or mitotic spindle-based cell division, cell motility, or cellular forces a simple rule-like GRN encoding and a simple internal/external chemical exchange mechanism confer the ability to generate patterns that are size regulated, and able to self-repair when damaged. In addition, we analyze the mechanisms that achieve size regulation and self-repair.