Male Fruit Fly Brain Trained t... Note
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Male Fruit Fly Brain Trained to Play Doom

Google recently created a detailed 3D model of a male fruit fly's brain and central nervous system. A software engineer then trained this digital brain model to play the original Doom game. Sensory neurons in the brain model were stimulated by each Doom frame. Neural activity was mapped to game controls, with damage providing a dopamine reward. This fruit fly brain model has since been adapted to control other games. Players can watch the fly play Doom in real-time on a website, seeing both its point of view and a third-person perspective. The fly's performance in Doom is currently quite poor. However, modders have had more success with Beat Saber, using reinforcement learning to train the fly. This training involved teaching it where and why to hit notes. The goal is to reduce reliance on external signals for more reactive gameplay. Another digital fly brain project, Flywire.AI, collaborated with Princeton University to analyze a female fruit fly brain. This project has also been used to control Super Mario 64 and Minecraft. While the number of neurons differs, the core concept of using a simulated fly brain for gameplay remains consistent.