What to watch
- As a standalone object it is a stable seven-cell still life.
- Placed correctly, it can eat a glider and return to its original form.
- It connects beginner still lifes to catalysts and signal cleanup.
Still lifes
Eater 1
A seven-cell still life that can absorb gliders in useful reactions.
Eater 1 is not important only because it is stable. It became a standard Life engineering object because it can remove specific moving debris while surviving the interaction.
Eater 1 is a still life that can do work
Eater 1 is a stable seven-cell pattern, but its real value appears in reactions: in the right position it can absorb a glider and recover, which makes it a basic cleanup object in Life engineering.
Still lifes7 cells4 x 4 boxperiod 1
- Category
- Still lifes
- Period
- 1
- Movement
- bounded
- Population
- 7 cells
- Bounding box
- 4 x 4
- Known since
- 1971
How to use it
Use it as the first step from passive still lifes toward practical Life engineering.
Open the pattern in the lab, reduce the speed, and use single-step mode when a phase change is hard to see. The green preview marks births in the next generation; red outlines mark live cells that will die.
Next experiments
Compare nearby patterns
Move between similar structures to see which facts change: box size, lifespan, extinction, motion, and final ash.
Boat
The only five-cell still life and a common small ash object.
- Size
- 3 x 3
- Lifespan
- 1
Herschel
A seven-cell methuselah and important signal object in Life circuitry.
- Size
- 3 x 4
- Lifespan
- 128 generations
Gosper glider gun
The first known finite pattern with unbounded growth.
- Size
- 36 x 9
- Lifespan
- 30