I'm getting well out of my domain here, but I'm wondering if there's some "common non-idealness" in FPGAs to be exploited which isn't accurately captured in sim

I'm getting well out of my domain here, but I'm wondering if there's some "common non-idealness" in FPGAs to be exploited which isn't accurately captured in simulators. Things like this: > A further five cells appeared to serve no logical purpose at all--there was no route of connections by which they could influence the output. And yet if he disconnected them, the circuit stopped working. > It appears that evolution made use of some physical property of these cells--possibly a capacitive effect or electromagnetic inductance--to influence a signal passing nearby. Somehow, it seized on this subtle effect and incorporated it into the solution. which could be implemented in a more general manner and don't rely on the peculiarities of a single board. It may not prove to be robust, but in a pure research sense I'd love to see it.