Computer Modelling of Evolution

The development of life on Earth is governed by the processes of evolution and natural selection. For humans, understanding evolutionary forces and the e ects of random mutations provides a solution to the fundamental question of how life came into existence. Generalizing the evolutionary process is the main aim of this project. The evolutionary process is investigated to determine the variant and invariant factors of evolutionary simulations. A C++ hierarchy class framework is introduced as a general model for evolution. Base classes are de ned for a general organism's phenotype (the actual living organism) and genotype (genetic information contained within an organism that is passed to o spring during reproduction). From these base classes, model speci c classes for any simulation can be derived. The variant parts of the evolutionary process are expressed as functions to be overridden in the base classes. Invariant parts are controlled by the framework. An analysis of two evolutionary simulations concludes the research. The rst simulation involves modelling peacock communities in an attempt to answer the question of why male peacocks have long, apparently counter-adaptive, tails. Although this appears to contradict the natural selection principle, simulation shows that genetic-based sexual preference in females can dominate survival considerations in males. The second simulation of a predator/prey scenario introduces organism interactions into the general framework. Results indicate that genetically based survival considerations in prey are in uenced by the amount of predation in the system.