"Aging as a loss of goal-directedness"

[dmm]

osf.io/preprints/osf/m5bnx_v1 (Michael Levin's collaboration, Feb 2025)

Aging as a loss of goal-directedness: an evolutionary simulation and analysis unifying regeneration with anatomical rejuvenation

Comments

[dmm]

They evolve Neural Cellular Automata models of morphogenesis.

"We deploy the evolved NCA solution for much longer times compared to the developmental stage at which the evolutionary selection occurs (c.f., fig. 2 (C, D)) and study the NCA’s long-term behavior with information-dynamic measures such as Active Information Storage (AIS)77, Transfer Entropy (TE)78, and Spatial Entropy (SE). This parallels a biological an organism’s ability to maintain its physiological integrity via multiscale homeodynamic competencies for much longer than necessary for genetic reproduction. In turn, this may lead to an accumulation of a variety of entropically and self-regulatory favored morphological changes that are not directly fatal but potentially increasingly dysfunctional, changing the setpoint of the unicellular ’agents’ self-regulatory scheme and leading to misdifferentation"

[dmm]

"Regeneration as the cure for aging ?"