Simulations of simulations in evolutionary robotics

Abstract

In recent years simulation tools for agent-environment interactions have included increasingly complex and physically realistic conditions. These simulations pose challenges for researchers interested in evolutionary robotics because the computational expense of running multiple evaluations can be very high. Here, we address this issue by applying evolutionary techniques to a simplified simulation of a simulation itself. We show this approach to be successful when transferring controllers evolved for example visual tasks from a simplified simulation to a comparatively rich visual simulation. © Springer-verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2007.