Lenia Swarm
Distributed Flow Lenia search, compendium indexing, and replay tools for studying persistent forms and behavior.
- Read the Lenia docs map.
- Open the Compendium Inspector to browse published creatures. For schema, taxonomy, and artifact details, use the schema and taxonomy docs.
- March 1, 2026Lenia cabinet docs rebuilt with current contracts, internals, and universe lanes.
- February 3, 2026Taxonomy/ecology/morphometrics synthesis reflected in docs and generated analysis notes.
- January 20, 2026IMGEP and activity-tracking surfaces were documented in generated implementation analysis.
Flow Lenia generalizes cellular automata to continuous state, time, and space. Two functions define the dynamics: a kernel K for neighborhood sensing and a growth function G for updates. Every persistent structure emerges from those two, from gliders and walkers up to self-replicators. The flow variant adds mass-conserving transport, so a creature stays a coherent object rather than a wave of growth and decay. We use it to search parameter space and index what stays alive.
Under perturbation, a Flow Lenia creature either returns to its baseline trajectory or settles into a different attractor. Each trial runs matched control-versus-intervention pairs across two environments, flat and high-theta, with three perturbation families. init_state re-seeds the initial mass placement. flow_regime halves the integration timestep. param_noise re-rolls the growth function, holding architecture fixed but resampling rule parameters.
Recovery is graded across the families. init_state perturbations leave the trajectory intact in nearly all cases. flow_regime perturbations recover in some. param_noise perturbations recover in few, and the failed recoveries sit far from baseline.
The morphospace track is separate from the creature-discovery track. Here the question is not whether every specimen looks beautiful; it is whether Flow Lenia's genotype-to-phenotype map has measurable topology, how that synthetic cloud sits near developmental and biological shape clouds, and where loop transport leaves residue.
We compare Flow Lenia forms, EmbryoMaker snapshots, and fish outlines in one descriptor space, then use TDA to mark loop candidates, cohort comparison to find Lenia neighborhoods near outside morphology, and transport to test whether a loop returns in state as well as shape.
The compendium is the materialized morphospace. 13,390 indexed creatures, 7,664 stable under standard initial conditions, spread across 698 species in 8 families. Each row ties a genotype to its phenotype, provenance, and a replay config.
Controller-worker topology over a SWIM gossip cluster, with an MLX Swift engine for GPU-accelerated Flow Lenia across Apple machines.
LeniaCore: physics engine, distributed actors, search infrastructure.LeniaCLI: headless workflows underdiscover,orchestrate,index,analyze,intervene,publish.LeniaStudio: macOS SwiftUI app for local exploration, host mode, and worker mode.
For deeper internals, see the cabinet docs.