Related papers: Speeding up evolutionary search by small fitness f…
We consider a linear size-structured population model with diffusion in the size-space. Individuals are recruited into the population at arbitrary sizes. The model is equipped with generalized Wentzell-Robin (or dynamic) boundary…
Natural selection drives populations towards higher fitness, but crossing fitness valleys or plateaus may facilitate progress up a rugged fitness landscape involving epistasis. We investigate quantitatively the effect of subdividing an…
The theory of life history evolution provides a powerful framework to understand the evolutionary dynamics of pathogens in both epidemic and endemic situations. This framework, however, relies on the assumption that pathogen populations are…
Population dynamics on a rugged landscape is studied analytically and numerically within a simple discrete model for evolution of N individuals in one-dimensional fitness space. We reduce the set of master equations to a single Fokker-Plank…
Environmental changes greatly influence the evolution of populations. Here, we study the dynamics of a population of two strains, one growing slightly faster than the other, competing for resources in a time-varying binary environment…
It has been shown that differences in fecundity variance can influence the probability of invasion of a genotype in a population, i.e. a genotype with lower variance in offspring number can be favored in finite populations even if it has a…
We consider a stochastic individual-based model of adaptive dynamics for an asexually reproducing population with mutation, with linear birth and death rates, as well as a density-dependent competition. To depict repeating changes of the…
The position of propagating population fronts fluctuates because of the discreteness of the individuals and stochastic character of processes of birth, death and migration. Here we consider a Markov model of a population front propagating…
The class of epistatic fitness landscapes is much more diverse than the class of non-epistatic landscapes, and so it stands to reason that there exist dynamical phenomena that can only be realized in the presence of epistasis. Here, we…
The expansion of a population into new habitat is a transient process that leaves its footprints in the genetic composition of the expanding population. How the structure of the environment shapes the population front and the evolutionary…
Dispersal of species to find a more favorable habitat is important in population dynamics. Dispersal rates evolve in response to the relative success of different dispersal strategies. In a simplified deterministic treatment (J. Dockery, V.…
To learn about the past from a sample of genomic sequences, one needs to understand how evolutionary processes shape genetic diversity. Most population genetic inference is based on frameworks assuming adaptive evolution is rare. But if…
In this thesis we develop minimal models of the relationship between motility, growth, and evolution of cancer cells. We utilise simple simulations of a population of individual cells in space to examine how changes in mechanical properties…
Biological populations are subject to fluctuating environmental conditions. Different adaptive strategies can allow them to cope with these fluctuations: specialization to one particular environmental condition, adoption of a generalist…
We examine the dynamics of an age-structured population model in which the life expectancy of an offspring may be mutated with respect to that of the parent. While the total population of the system always reaches a steady state, the…
Highly-diverse ecosystems exhibit a broad distribution of population sizes and species turnover, where species at high and low abundances are exchanged over time. We show that these two features generically emerge in the fluctuating phase…
We consider a population of genotype sequences evolving on a rugged fitness landscape with many local fitness peaks. The population walks uphill until it encounters a local fitness maximum. We find that the statistical properties of the…
The basic mechanics of evolution have been understood since Darwin. But debate continues over whether macroevolutionary phenomena are driven primary by the fitness structure of genotype space or by ecological interaction. In this paper we…
This is an introductory review of deterministic mutation-selection models for asexual populations (i.e., quasispecies theory) and related topics. First, the basic concepts of fitness, mutations, and sequence space are introduced. Different…
We study a stochastic spatial model of biological competition in which two species have the same birth and death rates, but different diffusion constants. In the absence of this difference, the model can be considered as an off-lattice…