Bak–Sneppen model

It was developed to show how self-organized criticality may explain key features of the fossil record, such as the distribution of sizes of extinction events and the phenomenon of punctuated equilibrium.

A comprehensive study of the details of this model can be found in Phys.

76, 348–351 (1996), which shows that the dynamics evolves sub-diffusively, driven by a long-range memory.

An evolutionary local search heuristic based on the Bak–Sneppen model, called extremal optimization, has been introduced in Boettcher, Stefan; Percus, Allon (2000).

After a long run there will be a minimum required fitness, below which species don't survive.