Welcome to REvoSim’s User Manual

The [R]apid [Evo]lutionary [Sim]ulator program.

REvoSim is an individual-based evolutionary model, using a simplified first-principles evolutionary model to facilitate high computational efficiency, enabling the simulation of large populations incorporating space, over geological time, using modest computer hardware. It can simulate populations of 105 –107 digital organisms over geological timescales, and incorporates spatial and temporal environmental variation, recombinant reproduction, mutation and dispersal. Speeds attainable depend on the computer hardware in use, the size of the populations simulated, and details of the experimental setup (most especially on whether species tracking and fitness recalculation are activated). With a typical 2018 desktop computer, speeds of between 500,000 and 1,000,000 iterations per hour can be achieved for populations of around 250,000.

REvoSim has been in development since 2008, and has been released with the intention that it can be used as a multipurpose platform for the study of many evolutionary phenomena (both macro- and microevolution). While it was designed with macroevolutionary studies in mind, it is also applicable to microevolutionary problems. As such it is complementary to the many other approaches of studying evolution on a range of different timescales, and will be continually developed by the core team to expand its capabilities.

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Relevant references

Garwood, R.J., Spencer A.R.T. and Sutton, M.D., 2019. REvoSim: Organism-level simulation of macro- and microevolution. Palaeontology.