SCIENCE AT THE EDGE SEMINAR

Friday, November 17,2006 at 11:30am
Room 1400 Biomedical and Physical Sciences Bldg.
Refreshments at 11:15

Speaker: Risto Miikkulainen
         Department of Computer Science
         University of Texas at Austin, TX 

Title:   Constructing Intelligent Agents through Neuroevolution

Abstract:

Neuroevolution, or training neural networks through genetic algorithms,
can potentially solve difficult sequential decision tasks.  Recurrent
neural networks can be evolved to map sequences of states directly to
optimal actions, which is a robust approach with continuous domains and
with hidden states.  In this talk, I will review recent advances in
neuroevolution methods, and present several applications ranging from
rocket control and autonomous vehicles to robotics and games.  In
particular, I will demonstrate the NERO machine learning game where the
player trains a team of non-player characters interactively in real time.