Modeling Neural Development with Braitenberg Vehicles

This project is about building an embodied cognitive simulation, i.e. that in which robots we call vehicles have a body and a simple "mind", represented by a neural activational network. The body has a defined shape, activator sensors that capture signals from the environment, and motors, that move the vehicle as a reaction to the signals. We then evolve neural networks inside vehicles using a Genetic Algorithm with an appropriate fitness function, and hope to observe some natural behavioural patterns as well as certain connectome motifs seen in nature. This would allow us to reproduce the very same behaviours’ simulation, as well as hypothesize on correspondence of connectome motifs to specific behaviours. This project's results have possible applications in brain development studies, as well as transferring synthesized behaviour models to robots and enriching virtual embodied systems’ intelligence (e.g. game AI).