<div dir="ltr"><span id="docs-internal-guid-2a870800-6917-6695-0053-162ede17af0c"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.15;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt"><span style="font-size:13px;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(0,0,0);background-color:transparent;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">***************************************************************************</span></p>
<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.15;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt"><span style="font-size:13px;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(0,0,0);background-color:transparent;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">*** CALL FOR PAPERS</span></p>
<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.15;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt"><span style="font-size:13px;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(0,0,0);background-color:transparent;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">*** 2014 GENETIC AND EVOLUTIONARY COMPUTATION CONFERENCE (GECCO-2014)</span></p>
<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.15;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt"><span style="font-size:13px;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(0,0,0);background-color:transparent;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">*** Generative and Developmental Systems (GDS) Track</span></p>
<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.15;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt"><span style="font-size:13px;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(0,0,0);background-color:transparent;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">*** July 12-16, 2014 in Vancouver, BC, Canada</span></p>
<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.15;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt"><span style="font-size:13px;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(0,0,0);background-color:transparent;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">*** Organized by ACM SIGEVO</span></p>
<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.15;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt"><span style="font-size:13px;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(0,0,0);background-color:transparent;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">*** </span><a href="http://www.sigevo.org/gecco-2014" style="text-decoration:none"><span style="font-size:13px;font-family:Arial;background-color:transparent;text-decoration:underline;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">http://www.sigevo.org/gecco-2014</span></a><span style="font-size:15px;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(0,0,0);background-color:transparent;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap"></span></p>
<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.15;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt"><span style="font-size:13px;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(0,0,0);background-color:transparent;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">*************************************************************************</span></p>
<br><span style="font-size:13px;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(0,0,0);background-color:transparent;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap"></span><p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.15;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt"><span style="font-size:13px;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(0,0,0);background-color:transparent;font-weight:bold;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">Deadlines coming up - required abstracts due Jan 15, papers due Jan 29 - no extensions this year!</span></p>
<br><span style="font-size:13px;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(0,0,0);background-color:transparent;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap"></span><p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.15;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt"><span style="font-size:13px;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(0,0,0);background-color:transparent;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">We invite you to submit your paper to the Generative and Developmental Systems (GDS) track at GECCO 2014. The focus of the GDS track is making artificially evolved systems scale to high complexity, with work ranging from biologically inspired approaches to automated engineering design. Each paper submitted to the GDS Track will be reviewed by experts in the field. The size and prestige of the GECCO conference will allow many researchers to learn about your work, both at the conference and via the proceedings (GECCO has the highest impact rating of all conferences in the field of Evolutionary Computation and Artificial Life).</span></p>
<br><span style="font-size:13px;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(0,0,0);background-color:transparent;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap"></span><h2 dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.15;margin-top:10pt;margin-bottom:0pt">
<span style="font-size:13px;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(0,0,0);background-color:transparent;font-weight:normal;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">TRACK DESCRIPTION</span></h2><p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.15;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt">
<span style="font-size:15px;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(0,0,0);background-color:transparent;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">---------------------------</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.15;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt">
<span style="font-size:13px;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(0,0,0);background-color:transparent;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">As artificial systems (of hardware, software and networks) continue to grow in size and complexity, the engineering traditions of rigid top-down planning and control are reaching the limits of their applicability. In contrast, biological evolution is responsible for the apparently unbounded complexity and diversity of living organisms. Yet, over 150 years after Darwin's and Mendel's work, and the subsequent "Modern Synthesis" of evolution and genetics, the developmental process that maps genotype to phenotype is still poorly understood. Understanding the evolution of complex systems - large sets of elements interacting locally and giving rise to collective behavior - will help us create a new generation of truly autonomous and adaptive artificial systems. The Generative and Developmental Systems (GDS) track seeks to unlock the full potential of in silico evolution as a design methodology that can "scale up" to systems of great complexity, meeting our specifications with minimal manual programming effort. Both qualitative and quantitative advances toward this long-term goal will be welcomed.</span></p>
<h3 dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.15;margin-top:8pt;margin-bottom:0pt"><span style="font-size:13px;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(0,0,0);background-color:transparent;font-weight:normal;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">Indirect and open-ended representations: The genotype is more than the information needed to produce a single individual. It is a layered repository of many generations of evolutionary innovation, shaped by two requirements: to be fit in the short term, and to be evolvable over the long term through its influence on the production of variation. "Indirect representations" such as morphogenesis or string-rewriting grammars, which rely on developmental or generative processes, may allow long-term improvements to the "genetic architecture" via accumulated layers of elaboration, and emergent new features. In contrast, "direct representations" are not capable of open-ended elaboration because they are restricted to predefined features.</span></h3>
<h3 dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.15;margin-top:8pt;margin-bottom:0pt"><span style="font-size:13px;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(0,0,0);background-color:transparent;font-weight:normal;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">Complex environments encourage complex phenotypes: While complex genotypes may not be required for success in simple environments, they may enable unprecedented phenotypes and behaviors that can later successfully invade new, uncrowded niches in complex environments; this can create pressure toward increasing complexity over the long term. Many factors may affect environmental (hence genotypic) complexity, such as spatial structure, temporal fluctuations, or competitive co-evolution.</span></h3>
<h3 dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.15;margin-top:8pt;margin-bottom:0pt"><span style="font-size:13px;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(0,0,0);background-color:transparent;font-weight:normal;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">More is more: Today's typical numbers of generations, sizes of populations, and components inside individuals are still too small. Just like physics needs higher-energy accelerators and farther-reaching telescopes to understand matter and space-time, evolutionary computation needs a boost in computational power to understand the generation of complex functionality. Biological evolution involved 4 billion years and untold numbers of organisms. Nature could afford to be "wasteful", but we cannot. We expect that datacenter-scale computing power will be applied in the future to produce artificially evolved artifacts of great complexity. How will we apply such resources most efficiently to "scale up" to high complexity?</span></h3>
<h3 dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.15;margin-top:8pt;margin-bottom:0pt"><span style="font-size:13px;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(0,0,0);background-color:transparent;font-weight:normal;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">How should we measure evolved complexity?: The GDS track has recently added a new focus: defining quantitative metrics of evolved complexity. (Which is more complex - a mouse, or a stegosaurus?) The evolutionary computing community is badly in need of such metrics, which may be theoretical (e.g., Kolmogorov complexity) or more practical. Ideally, such metrics will be applicable across multiple problem domains and genetic architectures; however, any efforts will be welcomed. We encourage authors to submit papers on these quantitative metrics, which will be given special attention by the track chairs this year.</span></h3>
<br><span style="font-size:13px;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(0,0,0);background-color:transparent;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap"></span><p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.15;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt"><span style="font-size:13px;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(0,0,0);background-color:transparent;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">The GDS track invites all papers addressing open-ended evolution, including, but not limited to, the areas of:</span></p>
<ul style="margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt"><li dir="ltr" style="list-style-type:disc;font-size:13px;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(0,0,0);background-color:transparent;vertical-align:baseline"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.15;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt">
<span style="font-size:13px;background-color:transparent;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">artificial development, artificial embryogeny</span></p></li><li dir="ltr" style="list-style-type:disc;font-size:13px;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(0,0,0);background-color:transparent;vertical-align:baseline">
<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.15;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt"><span style="font-size:13px;background-color:transparent;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">evo-devo robotics, morphogenetic robotics</span></p>
</li><li dir="ltr" style="list-style-type:disc;font-size:13px;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(0,0,0);background-color:transparent;vertical-align:baseline"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.15;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt">
<span style="font-size:13px;background-color:transparent;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">evolution of evolvability</span></p></li><li dir="ltr" style="list-style-type:disc;font-size:13px;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(0,0,0);background-color:transparent;vertical-align:baseline">
<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.15;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt"><span style="font-size:13px;background-color:transparent;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">gene regulatory networks</span></p></li><li dir="ltr" style="list-style-type:disc;font-size:13px;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(0,0,0);background-color:transparent;vertical-align:baseline">
<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.15;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt"><span style="font-size:13px;background-color:transparent;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">grammar-based systems, generative systems, rewriting systems</span></p>
</li><li dir="ltr" style="list-style-type:disc;font-size:13px;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(0,0,0);background-color:transparent;vertical-align:baseline"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.15;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt">
<span style="font-size:13px;background-color:transparent;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">indirect mappings, compact encodings, novel representations</span></p></li><li dir="ltr" style="list-style-type:disc;font-size:13px;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(0,0,0);background-color:transparent;vertical-align:baseline">
<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.15;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt"><span style="font-size:13px;background-color:transparent;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">morphogenetic engineering</span></p></li><li dir="ltr" style="list-style-type:disc;font-size:13px;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(0,0,0);background-color:transparent;vertical-align:baseline">
<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.15;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt"><span style="font-size:13px;background-color:transparent;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">neural development, neuroevolution, augmenting topologies</span></p>
</li><li dir="ltr" style="list-style-type:disc;font-size:13px;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(0,0,0);background-color:transparent;vertical-align:baseline"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.15;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt">
<span style="font-size:13px;background-color:transparent;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">synthetic biology, artificial chemistry</span></p></li><li dir="ltr" style="list-style-type:disc;font-size:13px;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(0,0,0);background-color:transparent;vertical-align:baseline">
<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.15;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt"><span style="font-size:13px;background-color:transparent;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">spatial computing, amorphous computing</span></p>
</li><li dir="ltr" style="list-style-type:disc;font-size:13px;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(0,0,0);background-color:transparent;vertical-align:baseline"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.15;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt">
<span style="font-size:13px;background-color:transparent;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">competitive co-evolution (arms races)</span></p></li><li dir="ltr" style="list-style-type:disc;font-size:13px;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(0,0,0);background-color:transparent;vertical-align:baseline">
<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.15;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt"><span style="font-size:13px;background-color:transparent;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">complex, spatially structured, and dynamically changing environments</span></p>
</li><li dir="ltr" style="list-style-type:disc;font-size:13px;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(0,0,0);background-color:transparent;vertical-align:baseline"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.15;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt">
<span style="font-size:13px;background-color:transparent;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">diversity preservation, novelty search</span></p></li><li dir="ltr" style="list-style-type:disc;font-size:13px;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(0,0,0);background-color:transparent;vertical-align:baseline">
<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.15;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt"><span style="font-size:13px;background-color:transparent;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">efficiently "scaling up" to large numbers of generations, individuals, and internal components</span></p>
</li><li dir="ltr" style="list-style-type:disc;font-size:13px;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(0,0,0);background-color:transparent;vertical-align:baseline"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.15;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt">
<span style="font-size:13px;background-color:transparent;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">measures of evolved complexity (theoretical, or practical)</span></p></li></ul><h2 dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.15;margin-top:10pt;margin-bottom:0pt">
<span style="font-size:13px;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(0,0,0);background-color:transparent;font-weight:normal;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">VENUE<br class="">-----------</span></h2><h2 dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.15;margin-top:10pt;margin-bottom:0pt">
<span style="font-size:13px;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(0,0,0);background-color:transparent;font-weight:normal;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">The track and conference will be held in Vancouver, BC, Canada.</span></h2>
<h2 dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.15;margin-top:10pt;margin-bottom:0pt"><span style="font-size:13px;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(0,0,0);background-color:transparent;font-weight:normal;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">IMPORTANT DATES</span></h2>
<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.15;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt"><span style="font-size:13px;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(0,0,0);background-color:transparent;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">---------------------------</span></p>
<ul style="margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt"><li dir="ltr" style="list-style-type:disc;font-size:13px;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(0,0,0);background-color:transparent;vertical-align:baseline"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.15;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt">
<span style="font-size:13px;background-color:transparent;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">Abstract submission: January 15, 2014 (required, new for 2014!)</span></p></li><li dir="ltr" style="list-style-type:disc;font-size:13px;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(0,0,0);background-color:transparent;vertical-align:baseline">
<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.15;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt"><span style="font-size:13px;background-color:transparent;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">Submission of full papers: January 29, 2014 (NO extensions this year)</span></p>
</li><li dir="ltr" style="list-style-type:disc;font-size:13px;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(0,0,0);background-color:transparent;vertical-align:baseline"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.15;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt">
<span style="font-size:13px;background-color:transparent;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">Notification of paper acceptance: March 12, 2014</span></p></li><li dir="ltr" style="list-style-type:disc;font-size:13px;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(0,0,0);background-color:transparent;vertical-align:baseline">
<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.15;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt"><span style="font-size:13px;background-color:transparent;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">Camera ready submission: April 14, 2014</span></p>
</li><li dir="ltr" style="list-style-type:disc;font-size:13px;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(0,0,0);background-color:transparent;vertical-align:baseline"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.15;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt">
<span style="font-size:13px;background-color:transparent;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">Advance registration: May 2, 2014</span></p></li><li dir="ltr" style="list-style-type:disc;font-size:13px;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(0,0,0);background-color:transparent;vertical-align:baseline">
<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.15;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt"><span style="font-size:13px;background-color:transparent;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">Conference: July 12-16, 2014 in Vancouver, BC, Canada</span></p>
</li></ul><br><span style="font-size:13px;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(0,0,0);background-color:transparent;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap"></span><p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.15;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt">
<span style="font-size:13px;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(0,0,0);background-color:transparent;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">FOR MORE INFORMATION:<br class="">-----------------------------------------</span></p>
<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.15;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt"><span style="font-size:13px;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(0,0,0);background-color:transparent;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">Please see the </span><a href="http://www.mepalmer.net/gds2014" style="text-decoration:none"><span style="font-size:13px;font-family:Arial;background-color:transparent;text-decoration:underline;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">GDS 2014 website</span></a><span style="font-size:13px;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(0,0,0);background-color:transparent;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">, </span><a href="http://www.mepalmer.net/gds2014" style="text-decoration:none"><span style="font-size:13px;font-family:Arial;background-color:transparent;text-decoration:underline;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">http://www.mepalmer.net/gds2014</span></a><span style="font-size:13px;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(0,0,0);background-color:transparent;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">, or email the GDS co-chairs, Michael Palmer (<a href="mailto:mepalmer@charles.stanford.edu">mepalmer@charles.stanford.edu</a>) and Sebastian Risi (<a href="mailto:sebastian.risi@gmail.com">sebastian.risi@gmail.com</a>).</span></p>
<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.15;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt"><span style="font-size:13px;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(0,0,0);background-color:transparent;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">Or you can join the </span><a href="https://groups.google.com/forum/#!forum/gds-gecco" style="text-decoration:none"><span style="font-size:13px;font-family:Arial;background-color:transparent;text-decoration:underline;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">GDS Google Group</span></a><span style="font-size:13px;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(0,0,0);background-color:transparent;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">, </span><a href="https://groups.google.com/forum/#!forum/gds-gecco" style="text-decoration:none"><span style="font-size:13px;font-family:Arial;background-color:transparent;text-decoration:underline;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">https://groups.google.com/forum/#!forum/gds-gecco</span></a><span style="font-size:13px;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(0,0,0);background-color:transparent;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">,  to see the latest updates.</span></p>
</span><div><br></div>-- <br><div dir="ltr">Dr. Sebastian Risi<br>Assistant Professor <br>IT University of Copenhagen, Room 5D08<br>Rued Langgaards Vej 7, 2300 Copenhagen, Denmark<br>email: <a href="mailto:sebastian.risi@gmail.com" target="_blank">sebastian.risi@gmail.com</a>, web: <a href="http://www.cs.ucf.edu/~risi/" target="_blank">http://www.cs.ucf.edu/~risi/</a>  <br>
mobile: +45-50250355, office: +45-7218-5127<br></div>
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