Abstract
Although cellular automata has origins dating from the 1950s, widespread popular interest did not develop until John Conway’s “Game of Life” cellular automaton was initially revealed to the public in a 1970 Scientific American article (Gardner in Sci. Am. 223:120–123, 1970). The feature of his “game” that probably evoked this intensive interest was the discovery of “oscillators” (periodic forms) and “gliders” (translating oscillators). This introductory chapter is for those who are either unfamiliar with the game, or feel that a brief “refresher course” would be appropriate.
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References
Bays, C.: A note on the Game of Life in hexagonal and pentagonal tessellations. Complex Syst. 15, 245–252 (2005)
Gardner, M.: The fantastic combinations of John Conway’s new solitaire game ‘life’. Sci. Am. 223, 120–123 (1970)
Preston, K., Jr., Duff, M.J.B.: Modern Cellular Automata. Plenum Press, New York (1984)
Wolfram, S.: A New Kind of Science. Wolfram Media, Champaign (2002)
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© 2010 Springer-Verlag London Limited
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Bays, C. (2010). Introduction to Cellular Automata and Conway’s Game of Life. In: Adamatzky, A. (eds) Game of Life Cellular Automata. Springer, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-84996-217-9_1
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-84996-217-9_1
Publisher Name: Springer, London
Print ISBN: 978-1-84996-216-2
Online ISBN: 978-1-84996-217-9
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