Autocatalytic networks (basics)

• Collections where members catalyze each other’s formation, enabling self‑maintenance.

Minimal proto‑agency criteria

• Closed‑loop maintenance: restore target ratios under perturbations.
• Counterfactual sensitivity: different interventions yield detectably different futures.
• Budgeted control: sensing/memory/actuation costs explicit.

Perturb‑and‑restore protocols

• Microfluidic feeds/inhibitors with periodic disturbances.
• Measure recovery time, invariants maintained, control gain.

Metrics (recovery, invariants, control gain)

• Stability region size; robustness; information‑to‑work conversion.

Further reading: Operational Criteria, Research Directions (autocatalysis tracks), Glossary.