Related papers: Slow evolution of vertebrates with large genomes
With a view to connecting random mutation on the molecular level to punctuated equilibrium behavior on the phenotype level, we propose a new model for biological evolution, which incorporates random mutation and natural selection. In this…
We study the information transfer model for biological evolution with several kinds of fitness function. The system is stimulated to volve into a stationary state, depending on the fitness function and on the dimension of the lattice formed…
Standard neutral population genetics theory with a strictly fixed population size has important limitations. An alternative model that allows independently fluctuating population sizes and reproduces the standard neutral evolution is…
A natural example of evolution can be described by a time-dependent two degrees-of-freedom Hamiltonian. We choose the case where initially the Hamiltonian derives from a general cubic potential, the linearised system has frequencies 1 and…
Large scale databases are available that contain homologous gene families constructed from hundreds of complete genome sequences from across the three domains of Life. Here we discuss approches of increasing complexity aimed at extracting…
Two evolutionary lineages: Machiavellian and Bohrian intelligence Mutation and natural selection are the two most basic processes of evolution, yet the study of their interplay remains a challenge for theoretical and empirical research.…
When a collection of phenotypically diverse organisms compete with each other for limited resources, with competition being strongest amongst the most similar, the population can evolve into tightly localised clusters. This process can be…
The current rate of species extinction is rapidly approaching unprecedented highs and life on Earth presently faces a sixth mass extinction event driven by anthropogenic activity, climate change and ecological collapse. The field of…
The concept of fitness as a measure for a species's success in natural selection is central to the theory of evolution. We here investigate how reproduction rates which are not constant but vary in response to environmental fluctuations,…
Sex chromosomes have evolved repeatedly across the Tree of Life, yet their evolutionary fates differ strikingly. In sharp contrast to mammals and birds with degenerated, stable Y/W chromosomes, in most amphibians, teleosts, non avian…
Migration between different habitats is ubiquitous among biological populations. In this Letter, we study a simple quasispecies model for evolution in two different habitats, with different fitness landscapes, coupled through one-way…
Much evolutionary information is stored in the fluctuations of protein length distributions. The genome size and non-coding DNA content can be calculated based only on the protein length distributions. So there is intrinsic relationship…
We analyze the geometry of the species- and genotype-size distribution in evolving and adapting populations of single-stranded self-replicating genomes: here programs in the Avida world. We find that a scale-free distribution (power law)…
How multicellular life forms evolved out from unicellular ones constitutes a major problem in our understanding of the evolution of our biosphere. A recent set of experiments involving yeast cell populations has shown that selection for…
We consider a simple-model population, whose individuals react with a certain delay to temporal variations of their habitat. We investigate the impact of such a delayed-answer on the survival chances of the population, both in a…
What is life. Schrodingers question is discussed here for a specific protein, villin, which builds cells in tissues that detect taste and sound. Villin is represented by a sequence of 827 amino acids bound to a peptide backbone chain. We…
In this communication, direction of evolutionary variability of parameters of genome size and structurally functional activity of plants in angiosperm taxa among life forms, are analysed. It is shown that, in the Cretaceous-Cenozoic era,…
Evolution is a dynamic process. The two classical forces of evolution are mutation and selection. Assuming small mutation rates, evolution can be predicted based solely on the fitness differences between phenotypes. Predicting an…
Tidal forces acting on galaxies in clusters lead to a strong dynamical evolution. In order to quantify the amount of evolution, I run self-consistent N-body simulations of disk galaxies for a variety of models in the hierarchically forming…
One essential ingredient of evolutionary theory is the concept of fitness as a measure for a species' success in its living conditions. Here, we quantify the effect of environmental fluctuations onto fitness by analytical calculations on a…