Related papers: Optimal strategies for fighting persistent bugs
Evolutionarily stable strategy (ESS) is an important solution concept in game theory which has been applied frequently to biological models. Informally an ESS is a strategy that if followed by the population cannot be taken over by a…
Phenotypic heterogeneity is a strategy commonly used by bacteria to rapidly adapt to changing environmental conditions. Here, we study the interplay between phenotypic heterogeneity and genetic diversity in spatially extended populations.…
Microbial communities are ubiquitous in nature and come in a multitude of forms, ranging from communities dominated by a handful of species to communities containing a wide variety of metabolically distinct organisms. This huge range in…
Disease outbreaks affect many ecosystems threatening species that also fight against other natural enemies. We investigate a cyclic game system with $5$ species, whose organisms outcompete according to the rules of a generalised spatial…
This study investigates the role of spatial segregation, prompted by competition avoidance, as a key mechanism for emergent coexistence within microbial communities. Recognizing these communities as complex adaptive systems, we challenge…
Optimal curing strategy of suppressing competing epidemics spreading over complex networks is a critical issue. In this paper, we first establish a framework to capture the coupling between two epidemics, and then analyze the system's…
The activity of growing living bacteria was investigated using real-time and in situ rheology -- in stationary and oscillatory shear. Two different strains of the human pathogen Staphylococcus aureus -- strain COL and its isogenic cell wall…
In apparent contradiction to competition theory, the number of known, co-existing plankton species far exceeds their explicable biodiversity - a discrepancy termed the Paradox of the Plankton. We introduce a new game-theoretic model for…
In this paper, we deal with a size-variable group of pedestrians moving in a unknown confined environment and searching for an exit. Pedestrian dynamics are simulated by means of a recently introduced microscopic (agent-based) model,…
Evolving systems, be it an antibody repertoire in the face of mutating pathogens or a microbial population exposed to varied antibiotics, constantly search for adaptive solutions in time-varying fitness landscapes. Generalists correspond to…
How will the novel coronavirus evolve? I study a simple epidemiological model, in which mutations may change the properties of the virus and its associated disease stochastically and antigenic drifts allow new variants to partially evade…
To explore the coupling between a growing population of microorganisms such as E. coli and a nonuniform nutrient distribution, we formulate a minimalistic model. It consists of active Brownian particles that divide and grow at a…
The CRISPR (clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats) mechanism allows bacteria to adaptively defend against phages by acquiring short genomic sequences (spacers) that target specific sequences in the viral genome. We…
Bacteria evolve in volatile environments and complex spatial structures. Migration, fluctuations and environmental variability therefore have a significant impact on the evolution of microbial populations. Here, we consider a class of…
Run-and-tumble is a basic model of persistent motion and a motility strategy widespread in micro-organisms and individual cells. In many natural settings, movement occurs in the presence of confinement. While accumulation at the surface has…
We consider a mutation-selection model of a population structured by the spatial variables and a trait variable which is the diffusion rate. Competition for resource is local in spatial variables, but nonlocal in the trait variable. We…
Assembling optimal microbial communities is key for various applications in biofuel production, agriculture, and human health. Finding the optimal community is challenging because the number of possible communities grows exponentially with…
Mixed dispersal syndromes have historically been regarded as bet-hedging mechanisms that enhance survival in unpredictable environments, ensuring that some propagules stay in the maternal environment while others can potentially colonize…
An impulsive model of augmentative biological control consisting of a general continuous predator-prey model in ordinary differential equations augmented by a discrete part describing periodic introductions of predators is considered. It is…
Antimicrobial resistance is becoming a major threat to public health throughout the world. Researchers are attempting to contrast it by developing both new antibiotics and patient-specific treatments. In the second case, whole-genome…