You can check here to see what strange new ideas I'm exploring in the hopes that I find something that I may want to pursue in graduate school someday.
Evolutionary Algorithms
"An evolutionary algorithm is a generic term used to indicate any population-based metaheuristic optimization algorithm that uses mechanisms inspired by biological evolution, such as reproduction, mutation and recombination." - www.wikipedia.com
I was fortunate enough to learn from one of the best in this business at Saint Cloud State University; Dr. Bryant Julstrom. He was the one who pounded C++ and data structures into my head my sophmore year, and introduced me to expert systems and evolutionary algorithms (EA) as a junior and senior respectively. While an extremely intelligent man in the area of artificial intelligence and computing in general, he is also an amazing motivator though I doubt he would ever claim such a thing. He sparked the curiousity that I now have for this subarea of artificial intelligence and for this I thank him. Maybe one day I'll get something together worth publishing and we'll meet again.
Dr. Julstrom's Homepage - http://web.stcloudstate.edu/bajulstrom/
In particular I plan to concentrate on genetic algorithms as they seemed the most interesting to me. I'll likely post some of my old papers from the courses I took here eventually as well as updates on current projects. Though the quality of my old projects is not good by any means, they will give you an idea as to what EA's are all about. I will also link you to some great papers I find through my research for you to see.
Conway's Game of Life
John Conway, A British mathematician, created this "game" in 1970 while studying a problem presented by the famous mathematician John von Neumann in the 1940's. The idea behind the game of life is that each cell on the grid follows a small set of rules. While there are many variations of the game, the orignal followed four simple rules;
1. Any live cell with fewer than two live neighbors dies, as if by loneliness.
2. Any live cell with more than three live neighbors dies, as if by overcrowding.
3. Any live cell with two or three live neighbors lives, unchanged, to the next generation.
4. Any dead cell with exactly three live neighbors comes to life.
The results that follow from observing these rules in action on a simple grid were surprising. Patterns appeared which seemed to build small "organisms" which replicate themselves or move across the grid on their own. Conway's game of life spawned an entirely new area of mathematical research called cellular automata.
I've written a Java based simulator which I may turn into a google gadget to add here at a later date. It allows you to setup and run the game of life under varying conditions including other popular rule-sets.