title: Evolutionary acquisition of a mortal genetic program: the origin of an altruistic gene.
abstract: As part of our research on programmed self-decomposition, we formed the hypothesis that originally immortal terrestrial organisms evolve into ones that are programmed for autonomous death. We then conducted evolutionary simulation experiments in which we examined this hypothesis using an artificial ecosystem that we designed to resemble a terrestrial ecosystem endowed with artificial chemistry. Notable results corroborating our hypothesis were obtained, which showed that mortal organisms emerged from indigenous immortal organisms through mutation; such mortal organisms survived and left behind offspring, albeit very rarely, and, having survived, surpassed immortal organisms without exception. In this article, we report the details of the above findings and also discuss a background framework we previously constructed for approaching altruism.
authors: Foundation for Advancement of International Science.
authors: Tsutomu
authors: T
authors: Oohashi
authors: Tadao
authors: T
authors: Maekawa
authors: Osamu
authors: O
authors: Ueno
authors: Norie
authors: N
authors: Kawai
authors: Emi
authors: E
authors: Nishina
authors: Manabu
authors: M
authors: Honda
mesh_terms: D000533:Altruism; D001185:Artificial Intelligence; D003585:Cell Biology; D019143:Evolution, Molecular; D006801:Humans; D019369:Life; D008957:Models, Genetic; D014584:User-Computer Interface