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Updated: Aug 7, 2026

Following the Dynamics of Structural Variants in Experimentally Evolved Populations
Published on: February 3, 2023
Objects that make objects: the population dynamics of structural complexity
James P Crutchfield1, Olof Görnerup
1Center for Computational Science and Engineering and Department of Physics, University of California, Davis, Davis, CA 95616, USA. chaos@cse.ucdavis.edu
Abstract:
To analyse the evolutionary emergence of structural complexity in physical processes, we introduce a general, but tractable, model of objects that interact to produce new objects. Since the objects--epsilon-machines--have well-defined structural properties, we demonstrate that complexity in the resulting population dynamical system emerges on several distinct organizational scales during evolution--from individuals to nested levels of mutually self-sustaining interaction. The evolution to increased organization is dominated by the spontaneous creation of structural hierarchies and this, in turn, is facilitated by the innovation and maintenance of relatively low-complexity, but general individuals.
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