
Evolutionary Robotics
The Biology, Intelligence, and Technology of Self-Organizing Machines
Bradford Books (Publisher)
Published on 30. January 2004
Book
Paperback/Softback
332 pages
978-0-262-64056-5 (ISBN)
Description
Evolutionary robotics is a new technique for the automatic creation of autonomous robots. Inspired by the Darwinian principle of selective reproduction of the fittest, it views robots as autonomous artificial organisms that develop their own skills in close interaction with the environment and without human intervention. Drawing heavily on biology and ethology, it uses the tools of neural networks, genetic algorithms, dynamic systems, and biomorphic engineering. The resulting robots share with simple biological systems the characteristics of robustness, simplicity, small size, flexibility, and modularity.In evolutionary robotics, an initial population of artificial chromosomes, each encoding the control system of a robot, is randomly created and put into the environment. Each robot is then free to act (move, look around, manipulate) according to its genetically specified controller while its performance on various tasks is automatically evaluated. The fittest robots then "reproduce" by swapping parts of their genetic material with small random mutations. The process is repeated until the "birth" of a robot that satisfies the performance criteria.This book describes the basic concepts and methodologies of evolutionary robotics and the results achieved so far. An important feature is the clear presentation of a set of empirical experiments of increasing complexity. Software with a graphic interface, freely available on a Web page, will allow the reader to replicate and vary (in simulation and on real robots) most of the experiments.
More details
Series
Language
English
Place of publication
Massachusetts
United States
Publishing group
MIT Press Ltd
Target group
Professional and scholarly
Interest Age: From 18 years
Product notice
Paperback (trade)
Dimensions
Height: 229 mm
Width: 178 mm
Thickness: 19 mm
Weight
544 gr
ISBN-13
978-0-262-64056-5 (9780262640565)
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Schweitzer Classification
Persons
Dario Floreano is Professor and Director of the Laboratory of Intelligent Systems and Institute for Systems Engineering at École Polytechnic Fédérale de Lausanne.
Author
Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche (CNR-ISTC)
DirectorEcole Polytechnique Federale de Lausanne