Evolution@Home
Encyclopedia
Evolution@Home is the first parallel computing
project for evolutionary biology. The aim of Evolution@Home is to improve understanding of evolutionary processes. This is achieved by simulating individual-based models. The first such model targets the accumulation of mutations in asexual populations and is implemented in Simulator005. The software of Evolution@Home is not the first to simulate this, but previous simulations were hampered by lack of memory (needed for looking at large populations) and lack of computing power (needed for observing long-term evolution and many different parameter combinations). The possibility of parallel computing
has allowed Evolution@Home to move the realism of simulated parameter combinations significantly towards observed reality.
Currently the project is operated semi-automatically, which means that a participant has to manually download tasks from the webpage and submit results by email. Development of a fully automated version is under way, but has repeatedly been delayed for a number of reasons. A network connecting the individual systems is required to be truly classified under distributed computing
Parallel computing
Parallel computing is a form of computation in which many calculations are carried out simultaneously, operating on the principle that large problems can often be divided into smaller ones, which are then solved concurrently . There are several different forms of parallel computing: bit-level,...
project for evolutionary biology. The aim of Evolution@Home is to improve understanding of evolutionary processes. This is achieved by simulating individual-based models. The first such model targets the accumulation of mutations in asexual populations and is implemented in Simulator005. The software of Evolution@Home is not the first to simulate this, but previous simulations were hampered by lack of memory (needed for looking at large populations) and lack of computing power (needed for observing long-term evolution and many different parameter combinations). The possibility of parallel computing
Parallel computing
Parallel computing is a form of computation in which many calculations are carried out simultaneously, operating on the principle that large problems can often be divided into smaller ones, which are then solved concurrently . There are several different forms of parallel computing: bit-level,...
has allowed Evolution@Home to move the realism of simulated parameter combinations significantly towards observed reality.
Currently the project is operated semi-automatically, which means that a participant has to manually download tasks from the webpage and submit results by email. Development of a fully automated version is under way, but has repeatedly been delayed for a number of reasons. A network connecting the individual systems is required to be truly classified under distributed computing
Distributed computing
Distributed computing is a field of computer science that studies distributed systems. A distributed system consists of multiple autonomous computers that communicate through a computer network. The computers interact with each other in order to achieve a common goal...
See also
- Artificial lifeArtificial lifeArtificial life is a field of study and an associated art form which examine systems related to life, its processes, and its evolution through simulations using computer models, robotics, and biochemistry. The discipline was named by Christopher Langton, an American computer scientist, in 1986...
- Digital organismDigital organismA digital organism is a self-replicating computer program that mutates and evolves. Digital organisms are used as a tool to study the dynamics of Darwinian evolution, and to test or verify specific hypotheses or mathematical models of evolution...
- Evolutionary computationEvolutionary computationIn computer science, evolutionary computation is a subfield of artificial intelligence that involves combinatorial optimization problems....
- Folding@homeFolding@homeFolding@home is a distributed computing project designed to use spare processing power on personal computers to perform simulations of disease-relevant protein folding and other molecular dynamics, and to improve on the methods of doing so...
- List of distributed computing projects