Degree in Evolutionary and Adaptive Systems
Since 1996, the University of Sussex has been offering a Master of Science (MSc) degree in Evolutionary and Adaptive Systems. Students initially follow taught courses, in preparation for an individual research project leading to a Masters thesis. The degree can be taken in one year full time, or part time over two years. This MSc has EPSRC funding which provides a substantial number of studentships and has enabled the addition of new modules and facilities. The study of natural and artificial evolutionary and adaptive systems are at the heart of important emerging approaches to artificial intelligence, cognitive science, computational biology and related areas. Sussex is internationally renowned for its research in these interdisciplinary areas and has probably the world's largest group in this field. The EASY MSc provides a solid grounding in the major themes of the area, including: artificial life, adaptive systems, biologically inspired robotics, complex adaptive systems, dynamical systems approaches to cognition, evolutionary systems and evolutionary computing, natural and artificial neural systems. This well established programme is taught by leading experts and there are many opportunities to interact with the thriving local community of researchers in this field. Students have access to specialist facilities including robotics labs. During the summer term a dissertation project is undertaken under the supervision of a member of faculty; this gives students the opportunity to further develop what they have learnt in the context of a piece of research. It is not unusual for work from dissertation project to be published in conference proceeding or journals.