Related papers: Optimality of mutation and selection in germinal c…
The adaptive immune system constantly remodels its lymphocyte repertoire for better protection against future pathogens. Its ability to improve antigen recognition on the fly relies on somatic mutation and selective expansion of B…
We study the evolution of mutation rates for an asexual population living on a static fitness landscape, consisting of multiple peaks forming an evolutionary staircase. The optimal mutation rate is found by maximizing the diffusion towards…
We consider an asexual biological population of constant size $N$ evolving in discrete time under the influence of selection and mutation. Beneficial mutations appear at rate $U$ and their selective effects $s$ are drawn from a distribution…
Classical population genetics a priori assigns fitness to alleles without considering molecular or functional properties of proteins that these alleles encode. Here we study population dynamics in a model where fitness can be inferred from…
The stochastic block model is widely used for detecting community structures in network data. How to test the goodness-of-fit of the model is one of the fundamental problems and has gained growing interests in recent years. In this article,…
Traditionally, it has been held that a central characteristic of stem cells is their ability to divide asymmetrically. Recent advances in inducible genetic labeling provided ample evidence that symmetric stem cell divisions play an…
A simple analytical framework to study the molecular quasispecies evolution of finite populations is proposed, in which the population is assumed to be a random combination of the constiyuent molecules in each generation,i.e., linkage…
A probability model is presented for the dynamics of mutation-selection balance in a haploid infinite-population infinite-sites setting sufficiently general to cover mutation-driven changes in full age-specific demographic schedules. The…
We study the effect of mutations in a simple model of colonization, based on Montecarlo simulations. When the population colonizes the whole available habitat, a maximum population density is reached, which depends on the mutation rate.…
One popular assumption regarding biological systems is that traits have evolved to be optimized with respect to function. This is a standard goal in evolutionary computation, and while not always embraced in the biological sciences, is an…
Several mating restriction techniques have been implemented in Evolutionary Algorithms to promote diversity. From similarity-based selection to niche preservation, the general goal is to avoid premature convergence by not having fitness…
The human immune system depends on a highly diverse collection of antibody-making B cells. B cell receptor sequence diversity is generated by a random recombination process called "rearrangement" forming progenitor B cells, then a Darwinian…
The n-person Prisoner's Dilemma is a widely used model for populations where individuals interact in groups. The evolutionary stability of populations has been analysed in the literature for the case where mutations in the population may be…
Under constant selection, each trait has a fixed fitness, and small mutation rates allow populations to efficiently exploit the optimal trait. Therefore it is reasonable to expect mutation rates will evolve downwards. However, we find this…
We consider a model of asexually reproducing individuals with random mutations and selection. The rate of mutations is proportional to the population size, $N$. The mutations may be either beneficial or deleterious. In a paper by Yu,…
New automated and high-throughput methods allow the manipulation and selection of numerous bacterial populations. In this manuscript we are interested in the neutral diversity patterns that emerge from such a setup in which many bacterial…
The adaptation of large asexual populations is hampered by the competition between independently arising beneficial mutations in different individuals, which is known as clonal interference. Fisher and Muller proposed that recombination…
Different evolutionary models are known to make disparate predictions for the success of an invading mutant in some situations. For example, some evolutionary mechanics lead to amplification of selection in structured populations, while…
Some clinical and pre-clinical data suggests that treating some tumors at a mild, patient-specific dose might delay resistance to treatment and increase survival time. A recent mathematical model with sensitive and resistant tumor cells…
Genetic fitness optimization using small populations or small population updates across generations generally suffers from randomly diverging evolutions. We propose a notion of highly probable fitness optimization through feasible…