Input-Supported Population Regulation of an Attractor Registry: Formation, Pruning, and a Two-Factor Substrate Boundary in an Online Cognitive Runtime

Early-stage preprint (pre-factorial intervention). Reports two design-frozen lifecycle protocols showing that ADAM's attractor registry expands under structured exposure (29/30 seeds), contracts under starvation (29/30 seeds), and persists under continued support. A 16-family boundary map characterizes the substrate conditions for formation. All pruning in the tracked cohort was death-mediated. This version predates the mechanism intervention (decay × ecology factorial) and second-family replication reported in subsequent work.