The robustness of small developed SBlock circuits using different clocking schemes

Abstract

Biological development is a stunning mechanism that allows robust generation of complex structures from a linear building plan. This makes it an interesting source of inspiration for solving problems where direct manipulation of a higher-order structure is hard, and the generative building plan can be used as a substitute for indirect manipulation of the unfolded structure. We investigate the possibility of adopting a nondeterministic developmental mapping in the evolution of electronic circuits, which demands that phenotypes be functionally stable despite limited structural change. We study the functional robustness of small SBlock circuits under different amounts and types of 'developmental' noise, using different clocking schemes. We report an exponential decrease in robustness with increasing noise. We provide experimental results that show that noise injected later on the developmental timescale shows less harmful then 'early' noise. This effect becomes more significant as the total amount of noise increases. The relative ranking of the effects of different types of noise seems not affected by the clocking scheme.