Author Topic: Prions  (Read 2568 times)

Offline spork22

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Prions
« on: June 12, 2014, 12:18:09 PM »
Perhaps Darwinbots 3 could also implement prions, a rogue protein that converts other proteins into more of itself. I don't know how that would work in DB3, though.
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Offline Numsgil

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Re: Prions
« Reply #1 on: June 12, 2014, 11:13:16 PM »
I think prions are functionally the same as viruses, so I'm lumping them together as essentially the same thing.  The thing is the simulation happens at a higher level than protein folding, so to add something like prions in you'd have to just arbitrarily add something to the simulation and call it a prion.  It wouldn't be a natural emergent property of the system.

An alife simulation that used some sort of simple biochemistry analog would be interesting, though.  Prions would fit right in in that sort of environment.  You'd want something simpler than actual protein folding, but a highly simplified atomic model would probably be possible.  Probably not free floating physics driven, though.  Or else you'd be running folding@home :)

Offline spork22

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Re: Prions
« Reply #2 on: June 13, 2014, 10:25:21 AM »
Yes, they're pretty much the same as viruses, except they don't alter the DNA of their host, they just turn everything they touch into more of themselves. How this could be interesting, I don't know, but it could help as a kind of killswitch, as it makes the bots die and turn into more of the prions. With viruses, the bots just turn into a virus factory which makes things really laggy. Prions could be used to just kill stuff off or something. I don't know.
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