Beckmann, McKinley, and Ofria featured in the media

Benjamin Beckmann, Philip McKinley, and Charles Ofria are featured in the Lansing State Journal article "MSU Research Looks at Meaning of Sleep." Their research investigates sleep evolution in digital organisms and could be applied to energy conservation models for wireless sensor networks and other electronic devices.

Beckmann, McKinley, and Ofria demonstrate that digital organisms can evolve adaptive sleeping and waking behavior in response to limited resources. Among the group’s findings was an "early to bed, early to rise" phenomenon in which digital organisms evolved to execute instructions before the start of their "day" and stop before "night" began.

The New Scientist Magazine article Digital Critters Shed Light on Sleep Evolution also describes their research.

Their paper, Evolution of an Adaptive Sleep Response in Digital Organisms, was presented earlier this year at the European Conference on Artificial Life in Lisbon, Portugal.

(Date Posted: 2007-11-26)