(this is not an oF project but it’s something that I plan on integrating into oF at some point)

There is much ongoing research into the simulation of relatively simple creatures. Not very different from how emulators for video games will create a virtual representation of all required hardware in order to accurately run games, researchers have successfully written simulations of the physical structure of the brains of organisms like as Drosophila melanogaster (fruit fly) and C. elegans (tiny nematode) with surprising results.

In the video above, the virtualized brain of C. elegans was successfully “transplanted” into a Lego robot, and surprisingly, the robot acted similarly to an actual live worm, reacting as expected to stimuli, avoiding obstacles, etc.

Thankfully, all of the work behind the simulation of C. elegans is open source through the OpenWorm project! This means we all get to play with real worms in our computers.

Read more here

“Is the robot a C. elegans in a different body or is it something quite new? Is it alive?“