What's Cooking?

RECENT ADDITIONS TO THE KITCHEN March 20: MJCell available for download ! We are delighted to announce the official release of MJCell, a Java companion to our favorite CA engine MCell. In maestro Mirek's own words, The most important addition is the ability to load patterns available on-line. The applet is accompanied by over 1000 such patterns. It runs now over 230 CA rules, and for the first time allows users to define and experiment with their own rules. The Chef says Check It Out! A great cookie recipe for Chocolate Cadillacs has been added to the Real Recipes collection. These were featured at my son Brian's senior piano recital. January 10: 2K or not 2K. That is the question. Our popular PSK Calendar has been recycled (with the same monthly images) for the new millennium. An updated version of Mirek's Cellebration is available from our mirror. Otherwise, only cosmetic changes have been made over the past couple of months. Matthew Cook, Cris Moore and I have spent far too much time in 3 Little Pigs mode of late, trying to protect the CA Constructions project described last September. The sad result of a huff I ought not detail: our forthcoming volume will be delayed several months. We hope and trust it will be worth the wait... November 7: PSK hosts the US mirror of MCell ! We are delighted to host the US mirror for Mirek's Cellebration, a 32-bit CA program for Windows, and far and away the best general-purpose engine on any platform. The mirror on our new server will be personally administered by Mirek Wójtowicz to ensure an accurate copy of the original at Mirek's site in Poland. Either way, a great CA resource! With its MJCell Java applets and many other features, the site provides an excellent introduction to cellular automata in their infinite variety. October 27: Primordial Soup for the New Millenium ! Our new Y2Kitchen server, more secure and much faster, is up and running without a hitch, thanks to the expertise of Brent Hetherwick. Try PSK Search and other interactive features to really appreciate the upgrade. Also, Mirek's Java Cellebration (MJCell, still in beta), a rich and robust companion to MCell, has been added to our CAffeine collection of Java CA applets. Virtually any MCell experiment has an MJCell companion for state-of-the-art online simulation. September 30: Back to school news Editorial work is proceeding on New Constructions in Cellular Automata, to be published next year by Oxford University Press. A preliminary contents is: I. CONWAY'S GAME OF LIFE AND ITS GENERALIZATIONS Nick Gotts, Self-Organized Construction in Sparse Random Game-of-Life Arrays Mark Niemiec, Synthesis of Complex Life Objects from Gliders Kellie Evans, Larger than Life: Bugs and Replicators II. COMPUTATION AND PREDICTION IN CELLULAR AUTOMATA Matthew Cook, TO BE ANNOUNCED Matthew Cook, NP-Completeness in Still Life Patterns Jonathan Machta and Cristopher Moore, How To Predict a Cellular Automaton Quickly, Or Prove That You (Probably) Can't III. GROWTH AND NUCLEATION Janko Gravner, Growth Phenomena in Cellular Automata David Griffeath and Dean Hickerson, A Two-dimensional Cellular Automaton Crystal with Irrational Density Steen Rasmussen, Polymer Lattice Gases IV. REVERSIBLE CELLULAR AUTOMATA Raissa D'Souza, Pattern Formation in Reversible Cellular Automata Norman Margolus, Large Universal Reversible CA's with a Realistic Interpolated Dynamics V. MISCELLANEOUS Nienke Oomes, Persistence of Income Inequality in a Nonlinear Voting Model Rudy Rucker, Two-Dimensional Continuous-Valued Cellular Automata Peter Hughes, Cellular Automata for Imaging, Art, and Animation Other plans this fall include switching to a new PSK server, which should provide better performance for visitors to the Kitchen, and installation of a US mirror site for MCell and its forthcoming Java cousin MJCell. Finally, an update of the Chef's Vita has been posted. August 20: MCell 2 available for download The official version 2 of Mirek's Cellebration, a fantastic 32-bit CA program for Windows, and far and away the best general-purpose engine on any platform, is now available for DOWNLOAD. The rightful successor to WinCA, Mirek Wójtowicz' MCell has now garnered top spot in our Kitchen Sink. Get it!. Otherwise, we've done lots of behind-the-scenes Kitchen maintenance over the past few weeks. Notably, a change in the Java spec had broken several of our CA applets. Thanks to the efforts of Bruce Christenson they are now all in working order again. A delicious appetizer, Reva's Tapenade, is new to the Real Recipes collection. July 10: Summer Update Over the past month the Chef has been working actively with Mirek Wójtowicz on the second version of his state-of-the-art CA experimentation program, now called Mirek's Cellebration. Among the new features is a simple Traffic CA model we have developed with Larry Gray of the University of Minnesota which exhibits intriguing features of traffic jams caused by acceleration and deceleration within a stream of cars. We strongly urge our visitors to try the current beta version of MCell, a 32-bit Windows program with a host of interactive features, and the heir apparent to our aging WinCA. Also in the works is a book on recent developments in CA research, tentatively entitled New Constructions in Cellular Automata, edited with Cris Moore of the Santa Fe Institute, and to be published next year by Oxford University Press. This volume promises a colorful overview of some of the most exciting developments in the area over the past decade, accessible to both students and the broader public with an interest in complex spatial systems. Check back for more information as the publication schedule progresses. May 20: Two Outstanding CA Resources Mirek Wójtowicz has now released version 1 of his superb (and free) MCLife, a 32-bit Windows CA simulator. His site also provides background on cellular automata, and links to other CA software platforms and resources. Highly recommended. And David Eppstein has a new Java applet with the most extensive available library of known spaceships for 2d nearest neighbor totalistic CA. These are easily captured in .lif format, after which they can be fed to an engine such as Life32 to see the dynamics. Contact David if you have additional entries. An article with Dean Hickerson entitled A Two-dimensional Cellular Automaton Crystal with Irrational Density has been added to our Research Papers collection. We describe the elaborate construction of a 2,392 cell Game of Life seed which spreads recursively, based on the binary Fibonacci sequence known as the Golden String. Some companion electronic resources are also available here. April 12: Sign of the Times A March 23 write-up of evolving cellular automata in the (on-line) Science/Health section of the New York Times contained a link to the PSK, resulting in record traffic for the day, week and month. We have archived the article, which describes ongoing research of Jim Crutchfield and Melanie Mitchell at the Santa Fe Institute. The Chef has added an elegant entree to the Real Recipes collection: Stuffed Crown Roast of Pork, suitable for any neo-pagan seasonal feast. Try it, and give our struggling Wisconsin pig farmers some much needed business. Fall/Winter 98-99 Additions Spring/Summer 98 Additions Winter 97-8 Additions Fall 97 Additions Summer 97 Additions Spring 97 Additions Winter 96-7 Additions Fall 96 Additions