Physical Sciences and Mathematics Commons^™

Effective Ann Topologies For Use As Genotypes For Evaluating Design And Fabrication, John R. Peterson

Honors Theses

There is promise in the field of Evolutionary Design for systems that evolve not only what to manufacture but also how to manufacture it. EvoFab is a system that uses Genetic Algorithms to evolve Artificial Neural Networks (ANNs) which control a modified 3d-printer with the goal of automating some level of invention. ANNs are an obvious choice for use with a system like this as they are canonically evolvable encodings, and have been successfully used as evolved control systems in Evolutionary Robotics. However, there is little known about how the structural characteristics of an ANN affect the shapes that can …