Exploiting Mate Choice in Evolutionary Computation: Sexual Selection as a Process of Search, Optimization, And Diversification

Sexual selection through mate choice is a powerful evolutionary process that has been important in the success of sexually-reproducing animals and flowering plants. Over the short term, mate preferences evolve because they improve the outcome of sexual recombination. Over the long term, assortative mate preferences can help maintain genetic diversity, promote speciation, and facilitate evolutionary search through optimal outbreeding; selective mate preferences can reinforce the speed, accuracy, and efficiency of natural selection, can foster the discovery and propagation of evolutionary innovations, and can function as aesthetic selection criteria. These strengths of sexual selection complement those of natural selection, so using both together may prove particularly fruitful in evolutionary computation. This paper reviews the biological theory of sexual selection and some possible applications of sexual selection in evolutionary search, optimization, and diversification. Simulation results are used to illustrate some key points.

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