Work

Competition and Cooperation in One-Dimensional Stepping-Stone Models

Year: 2011

Type: article

Abstract: Mutualism is a major force driving evolution and sustaining ecosystems. Although the importance of spatial degrees of freedom and number fluctuations is well known, their effects on mutualism are not fully understood. With range expansions of microbes in mind, we show that, even when mutualism confers a selective advantage, it persists only in populations with high density and frequent migrations. When these parameters are reduced, mutualism is generically lost via a directed percolation (DP) process, with a phase diagram strongly influenced by an exceptional symmetric DP (DP2) transition.

Source: Physical Review Letters

DOI: 10.1103/physrevlett.107.088103

Authors: K. S. Korolev, David R. Nelson

Institutions: Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Harvard University, Center for Systems Biology

Language: English

Topic: Mathematical and Theoretical Epidemiology and Ecology Models

Subfield: Public Health, Environmental and Occupational Health

Field: Medicine

Domain: Health Sciences

Open Access status: bronze

Funders: National Science Foundation, Materials Research Science and Engineering Center, Harvard University, Division of Materials Research

Awards: G3646433677, Theoretical Problems in Soft Matter and Quantitative Biology, Materials Research Science and Engineering Center, G69416479