Darwinbots Forum

General => Biology => Topic started by: Endy on June 23, 2005, 04:26:55 AM

Title: Reproduction Stratagies
Post by: Endy on June 23, 2005, 04:26:55 AM
Found this page while surfing thought it'd be good for anyone interested to take a look at.
Reproduction Link (http://users.rcn.com/jkimball.ma.ultranet/BiologyPages/A/AsexualReproduction.html)

I think the part I like the best is talk about polyploid cells(cells having more than 2 chromosomes). Kind of curious how many chromo's the DB's will decide to use once the system is up.

Also ran into something called imprinting, not real clear on what it's describing, but seems like it might be important.

Endy B)
Title: Reproduction Stratagies
Post by: Ulciscor on June 23, 2005, 04:50:36 AM
I think imprinting is the process that 'decides' which of the alleles, the father's or mother's, present in the cell are expressed. It's also something to do with a gene behaving differently depending on the parent it came from... I have a book about this somewhere which I have conveniently lost.  :burnup:
Mind you there is the other kind of imprinting, the one where newly borns match the first thing they see to be their parent, which I was also thinking it might be cool to have, if it isn't there already.
Title: Reproduction Stratagies
Post by: Ulciscor on June 23, 2005, 05:03:52 AM
Aha! I have found it! It was propping up my desk leg to stop the whole thing from wobbling lol.
OK well it says imprinting is a feature of placental mammals and of plants whose seeds gain sustenance from the parent plant. Which I think applies to DB.
The example they give is of the paternal genes being expressed to create the placenta during pregnancy and the maternal genes are responsible for the organising of the foetus. And there is some weird stuff about the placenta being a paternal organ created to allow th foetus more of the mother's resources blah blah blah...
This doesn't sound particularly DB to me, I might have the wrond end of the stick though.
Title: Reproduction Stratagies
Post by: Numsgil on June 23, 2005, 02:00:43 PM
Cool link, this is what I gathered from it:

Once we get sexual reproduction working well, we need to set up the scripts to allow changes in the environment from time to time.

Seems sex is mainly beneficial if the organism has to adapt further.  AFter all, if you're perfectly adapted, there's not much point in mutating or trying to be better.

Or alternatively, we set up different areas of the egrid to use different physical constants, and see if the bots radiate (ie: specialize), and wether or not sexual reproduction does it faster (is there an advantage?).
Title: Reproduction Stratagies
Post by: Ulciscor on June 23, 2005, 05:28:40 PM
I don't get why the environment needs to change when the other bots' evolving will provide the dynamics for natural selection. Won't two competing species co-evolve depending on the other rather than the environment?
Title: Reproduction Stratagies
Post by: Numsgil on June 23, 2005, 05:31:57 PM
Assuming we can actually create two species co-existing, yeah, that would work too.

I can't even get vegs to survive without repoping except through cancer (which doesn't work when I set the veg feeding method to nrg/kilobody).
Title: Reproduction Stratagies
Post by: Endy on June 23, 2005, 05:37:05 PM
Quote
It was propping up my desk leg to stop the whole thing from wobbling lol.

Ah a fine use of a biology book :)

Imprinting

So based on the parent the chromosome(w/genes) comes from, the gene could change in behavior. Whew I think I can just barely wrap my mind around that one :blink: Still sounds like this could lead to some pretty advanced behaviors.

Endy B)
Title: Reproduction Stratagies
Post by: Ulciscor on June 23, 2005, 05:43:08 PM
I was thinking and this must mean the gene is common in both parents I.e. an allele.
I also found more examples like a gene in a male moose using calcium to make horns but the same gene used for making milk in females. But since this whole thing seems to be gender based I don't know how it would work.
No wait! Surely imprinting takes place when a gene for blue eyes and a gene for green eyes is inherited? Or is this about which gene is dominant? I will have to look this up.
Title: Reproduction Stratagies
Post by: Endy on June 23, 2005, 05:51:07 PM
Parent A - XX
Parent B - XY

We just record from which parent a specific chromosome "letter" comes from. If the child has XY for example it could know the Y is from it's father and the X from the mother. Possibly just save it as a variable to pass the info onto the bot.

Endy B)