| 1. |
- Gyllingberg, Linnéa, et al.
(författare)
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Finding analytical approximations for discrete, stochastic, individual-based models of ecology
- 2023
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Ingår i: Mathematical Biosciences. - : Elsevier. - 0025-5564 .- 1879-3134. ; 365
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Discrete time, spatially extended models play an important role in ecology, modelling population dynamics of species ranging from micro-organisms to birds. An important question is how ’bottom up’, individual-based models can be approximated by ’top down’ models of dynamics. Here, we study a class of spatially explicit individual-based models with contest competition: where species compete for space in local cells and then disperse to nearby cells. We start by describing simulations of the model, which exhibit large-scale discrete oscillations and characterize these oscillations by measuring spatial correlations. We then develop two new approximate descriptions of the resulting spatial population dynamics. The first is based on local interactions of the individuals and allows us to give a difference equation approximation of the system over small dispersal distances. The second approximates the long-range interactions of the individual-based model. These approximations capture demographic stochasticity from the individual-based model and show that dispersal stabilizes population dynamics. We calculate extinction probability for the individual-based model and show convergence between the local approximation and the non-spatial global approximation of the individual-based model as dispersal distance and population size simultaneously tend to infinity. Our results provide new approximate analytical descriptions of a complex bottom-up model and deepen understanding of spatial population dynamics.
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| 2. |
- Brännström, Åke, 1975-, et al.
(författare)
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Rigorous conditions for food-web intervality in high-dimensional trophic niche spaces
- 2011
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Ingår i: Journal of Mathematical Biology. - : Springerlink. - 0303-6812 .- 1432-1416. ; 63:3, s. 575-592
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Food webs represent trophic (feeding) interactions in ecosystems. Since the late 1970s, it has been recognized that food-webs have a surprisingly close relationship to interval graphs. One interpretation of food-web intervality is that trophic niche space is low-dimensional, meaning that the trophic character of a species can be expressed by a single or at most a few quantitative traits. In a companion paper we demonstrated, by simulating a minimal food-web model, that food webs are also expected to be interval when niche-space is high-dimensional. Here we characterize the fundamental mechanisms underlying this phenomenon by proving a set of rigorous conditions for food-web intervality in high-dimensional niche spaces. Our results apply to a large class of food-web models, including the special case previously studied numerically.
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| 3. |
- Brännström, Åke, 1975-, et al.
(författare)
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Consequences of fluctuating group size for the evolution of cooperation
- 2011
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Ingår i: Journal of Mathematical Biology. - : SpringerLink. - 0303-6812 .- 1432-1416. ; 63:2, s. 263-281
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Studies of cooperation have traditionally focused on discrete games such as the well-known prisoner’s dilemma, in which players choose between two pure strategies: cooperation and defection. Increasingly, however, cooperation is being studied in continuous games that feature a continuum of strategies determining the level of cooperative investment. For the continuous snowdrift game, it has been shown that a gradually evolving monomorphic population may undergo evolutionary branching, resulting in the emergence of a defector strategy that coexists with a cooperator strategy. This phenomenon has been dubbed the ‘tragedy of the commune’. Here we study the effects of fluctuating group size on the tragedy of the commune and derive analytical conditions for evolutionary branching. Our results show that the effects of fluctuating group size on evolutionary dynamics critically depend on the structure of payoff functions. For games with additively separable benefits and costs, fluctuations in group size make evolutionary branching less likely, and sufficiently large fluctuations in group size can always turn an evolutionary branching point into a locally evolutionarily stable strategy. For games with multiplicatively separable benefits and costs, fluctuations in group size can either prevent or induce the tragedy of the commune. For games with general interactions between benefits and costs, we derive a general classification scheme based on second derivatives of the payoff function, to elucidate when fluctuations in group size help or hinder cooperation.
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| 4. |
- Brännström, Åke, et al.
(författare)
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The Hitchhiker's guide to adaptive dynamics
- 2013
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Ingår i: Games. - : MDPI AG. - 2073-4336. ; 4:3, s. 304-328
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Adaptive dynamics is a mathematical framework for studying evolution. It extends evolutionary game theory to account for more realistic ecological dynamics and it can incorporate both frequency- and density-dependent selection. This is a practical guide to adaptive dynamics that aims to illustrate how the methodology can be applied to the study of specific systems. The theory is presented in detail for a single, monomorphic, asexually reproducing population. We explain the necessary terminology to understand the basic arguments in models based on adaptive dynamics, including invasion fitness, the selection gradient, pairwise invasibility plots (PIP), evolutionarily singular strategies, and the canonical equation. The presentation is supported with a worked-out example of evolution of arrival times in migratory birds. We show how the adaptive dynamics methodology can be extended to study evolution in polymorphic populations using trait evolution plots (TEPs). We give an overview of literature that generalises adaptive dynamics techniques to other scenarios, such as sexual, diploid populations, and spatially-structured populations. We conclude by discussing how adaptive dynamics relates to evolutionary game theory and how adaptive-dynamics techniques can be used in speciation research.
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| 5. |
- Coder Gylling, Kira, 1988-, et al.
(författare)
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Effects of Relatedness on the Evolution of Cooperation in Nonlinear Public Goods Games
- 2018
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Ingår i: Games. - : MDPI. - 2073-4336. ; 9:4
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Evolution of cooperation has traditionally been studied by assuming that individuals adopt either of two pure strategies, to cooperate or defect. Recent work has considered continuous cooperative investments, turning full cooperation and full defection into two opposing ends of a spectrum and sometimes allowing for the emergence of the traditionally-studied pure strategies through evolutionary diversification. These studies have typically assumed a well-mixed population in which individuals are encountered with equal probability. Here, we allow for the possibility of assortative interactions by assuming that, with specified probabilities, an individual interacts with one or more other individuals of the same strategy. A closely related assumption has previously been made in evolutionary game theory and has been interpreted in terms of relatedness. We systematically study the effect of relatedness and find, among other conclusions, that the scope for evolutionary branching is reduced by either higher average degree of, or higher uncertainty in, relatedness with interaction partners. We also determine how different types of non-linear dependencies of benefits and costs constrain the types of evolutionary outcomes that can occur. While our results overall corroborate the conclusions of earlier studies, i.e. higher relatedness promotes the evolution of cooperation, our investigation gives a comprehensive picture of how relatedness affects the evolution of cooperation with continuous investments.
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| 6. |
- Cornforth, Daniel M., et al.
(författare)
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Synergy and Group Size in Microbial Cooperation
- 2012
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Ingår i: American Naturalist. - : University of Chicago Press. - 0003-0147 .- 1537-5323. ; 180:3, s. 296-305
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Microbes produce many molecules that are important for their growth and development, and the exploitation of these secretions by nonproducers has recently become an important paradigm in microbial social evolution. Although the production of these public-goods molecules has been studied intensely, little is known of how the benefits accrued and the costs incurred depend on the quantity of public-goods molecules produced. We focus here on the relationship between the shape of the benefit curve and cellular density, using a model assuming three types of benefit functions: diminishing, accelerating, and sigmoidal (accelerating and then diminishing). We classify the latter two as being synergistic and argue that sigmoidal curves are common in microbial systems. Synergistic benefit curves interact with group sizes to give very different expected evolutionary dynamics. In particular, we show that whether and to what extent microbes evolve to produce public goods depends strongly on group size. We show that synergy can create an "evolutionary trap" that can stymie the establishment and maintenance of cooperation. By allowing density-dependent regulation of production (quorum sensing), we show how this trap may be avoided. We discuss the implications of our results on experimental design.
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| 7. |
- Jang, Yun-Ting, et al.
(författare)
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The interactive effects of environmental gradient and dispersal shape spatial phylogenetic patterns
- 2022
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Ingår i: Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution. - : Frontiers Media S.A.. - 2296-701X. ; 10
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Introduction: The emergence and maintenance of biodiversity include interacting environmental conditions, organismal adaptation to such conditions, and dispersal. To understand and quantify such ecological, evolutionary, and spatial processes, observation and interpretation of phylogenetic relatedness across space (e.g., phylogenetic beta diversity) is arguably a way forward as such patterns contain signals from all the processes listed above. However, it remains challenging to extract information about complex eco-evolutionary and spatial processes from phylogenetic patterns.Methods: We link environmental gradients and organismal dispersal with phylogenetic beta diversity using a trait-based and eco-evolutionary model of diversification along environmental gradients. The combined effect of the environment and dispersal leads to distinct phylogenetic patterns between subsets of species and across geographical distances.Results and discussion: Steep environmental gradients combined with low dispersal lead to asymmetric phylogenies, a high phylogenetic beta diversity, and the phylogenetic diversity between communities increases linearly along the environmental gradient. High dispersal combined with a less steep environmental gradient leads to symmetric phylogenies, low phylogenetic beta diversity, and the phylogenetic diversity between communities along the gradient increases in a sigmoidal form. By disentangling the eco-evolutionary mechanisms that link such interacting environment and dispersal effects and community phylogenetic patterns, our results improve understanding of biodiversity in general and help interpretation of observed phylogenetic beta diversity.
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| 8. |
- Nonaka, Etsuko, 1971-, et al.
(författare)
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Assortative mating can limit the evolution of phenotypic plasticity
- 2014
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Ingår i: Evolutionary Ecology. - : Springer. - 0269-7653 .- 1573-8477. ; 28:6, s. 1057-1074
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Phenotypic plasticity, the ability to adjust phenotype to the exposed environment, isoften advantageous for organisms in heterogeneous environments. Although the degrees ofplasticity appear limited in nature, many studies have reported low costs of plasticity invarious species. Existing studies argue for ecological, genetic, or physiological costs orselection eliminating plasticity with high costs, but have not considered costs arising fromsexual selection. Here, we show that sexual selection caused by mate choice can impede theevolution of phenotypic plasticity in a trait used for mate choice. Plasticity can remain low tomoderate even in the absence of physiological or genetic costs, when individualsphenotypically adapted to contrasting environments through plasticity can mate with eachother and choose mates based on phenotypic similarity. Because the non-choosy sex (i.e.,males) with lower degrees of plasticity are more favored in matings by the choosy sex (i.e.,females) adapted to different environments, directional selection toward higher degrees ofplasticity is constrained by sexual selection. This occurs at intermediate strengths of femalechoosiness we tested. Our results demonstrate that mate choice is a potential source of anindirect cost to phenotypic plasticity.
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| 9. |
- Rossberg, Axel G, et al.
(författare)
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Food-web structure in low- and high-dimensional trophic niche spaces
- 2010
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Ingår i: Journal of the Royal Society Interface. - : Royal Society Publishing. - 1742-5689 .- 1742-5662. ; 7:53, s. 1735-1743
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- A question central to modelling and, ultimately, managing food webs concerns the dimensionality of trophic niche space, that is, the number of independent traits relevant for determining consumer-resource links. Food-web topologies can often be interpreted by assuming resource traits to be specified by points along a line and each consumer's diet to be given by resources contained in an interval on this line. This phenomenon, called intervality, has been known for 30 years and is widely acknowledged to indicate that trophic niche space is close to one-dimensional. We show that the degrees of intervality observed in nature can be reproduced in arbitrary-dimensional trophic niche spaces, provided that the processes of evolutionary diversification and adaptation are taken into account. Contrary to expectations, intervality is least pronounced at intermediate dimensions and steadily improves towards lower- and higher-dimensional trophic niche spaces.
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| 10. |
- Rossberg, Axel, et al.
(författare)
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How trophic interaction strength depends on traits : A conceptual framework for representing multidimensional trophic niche spaces
- 2010
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Ingår i: Theoretical Ecology. - : Springer Netrherlands. - 1874-1738 .- 1874-1746. ; 3:1, s. 13-24
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- A key problem in community ecology is to understand how individual-level traits give rise to population-level trophic interactions. Here, we propose a synthetic framework based on ecological considerations to address this question systematically. We derive a general functional form for the dependence of trophic interaction coefficients on trophically relevant quantitative traits of consumers and resources. The derived expression encompasses—and thus allows a unified comparison of—several functional forms previously proposed in the literature. Furthermore, we show how a community’s, potentially low-dimens ional, effective trophic niche space is related to its higher-dimensional phenotypic trait space. In this manner, we give ecological meaning to the notion of the “dimensionality of trophic niche space.” Our framework implies a method for directly measuring this dimensionality. We suggest a procedure for estimating the relevant parameters from empirical data and for verifying that such data matches the assumptions underlying our derivation.
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