Distinguished Lecture in Computing + Mathematical Sciences

Thursday October 16, 2014 4:00 PM

Computational Insights and the Theory of Evolution

Speaker: Christos H. Papadimitriou, UC Berkeley
Location: Guggenheim 133 (Lees-Kubota Lecture Hall)

Covertly computational ideas have influenced the Theory of Evolution from the very start.   This talk is about recent work on Evolution that was inspired and informed by computation. Considerations about the performance of genetic algorithms led to a novel theory of the role of sex in Evolution based on the concept of mixability, while the equations describing the evolution of a species can be reinterpreted as a repeated game between genes.  The complexity of local optimality informs the mystery of variation, and a theorem on Boolean functions helps us understand better the emergence of complex adaptations.

Contact: Diane Goodfellow at 626.395.6842 diane@cs.caltech.edu