Browse
Submit Data
Databases
API
Help

Dataset Information

27 Views

0 Connections

0 Citations

0 Reanalyses

0 Downloads

Omics score: 0

Pathogen evolution in finite populations: slow and steady spreads the best.

ABSTRACT: The theory of life-history evolution provides a powerful framework to understand the evolutionary dynamics of pathogens. It assumes, however, that host populations are large and that one can neglect the effects of demographic stochasticity. Here, we expand the theory to account for the effects of finite population size on the evolution of pathogen virulence. We show that demographic stochasticity introduces additional evolutionary forces that can qualitatively affect the dynamics and the evolutionary outcome. We discuss the importance of the shape of the pathogen fitness landscape on the balance between mutation, selection and genetic drift. This analysis reconciles Adaptive Dynamics with population genetics in finite populations and provides a new theoretical toolbox to study life-history evolution in realistic ecological scenarios.

SUBMITTER: Parsons TL

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6228476 | biostudies-literature | 2018 Oct

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

ACCESS DATA

Json Xml

Publications

Pathogen evolution in finite populations: slow and steady spreads the best.

Parsons Todd L TL Lambert Amaury A Day Troy T Gandon Sylvain S

Journal of the Royal Society, Interface 20181003 147

The theory of life-history evolution provides a powerful framework to understand the evolutionary dynamics of pathogens. It assumes, however, that host populations are large and that one can neglect the effects of demographic stochasticity. Here, we expand the theory to account for the effects of finite population size on the evolution of pathogen virulence. We show that demographic stochasticity introduces additional evolutionary forces that can qualitatively affect the dynamics and the evoluti ...[more]

PMID: 30282758

Similar Datasets

Biology-Culture Co-evolution in Finite Populations.

Project description:Language is the result of two concurrent evolutionary processes: biological and cultural inheritance. An influential evolutionary hypothesis known as the moving target problem implies inherent limitations on the interactions between our two inheritance streams that result from a difference in pace: the speed of cultural evolution is thought to rule out cognitive adaptation to culturally evolving aspects of language. We examine this hypothesis formally by casting it as as a problem of adaptation in time-varying environments. We present a mathematical model of biology-culture co-evolution in finite populations: a generalisation of the Moran process, treating co-evolution as coupled non-independent Markov processes, providing a general formulation of the moving target hypothesis in precise probabilistic terms. Rapidly varying culture decreases the probability of biological adaptation. However, we show that this effect declines with population size and with stronger links between biology and culture: in realistically sized finite populations, stochastic effects can carry cognitive specialisations to fixation in the face of variable culture, especially if the effects of those specialisations are amplified through cultural evolution. These results support the view that language arises from interactions between our two major inheritance streams, rather than from one primary evolutionary process that dominates another.

| S-EPMC5775438 | biostudies-literature

Slow and steady: the evolution of cranial disparity in fossil and recent turtles.

Project description:Turtles (Testudinata) are a diverse group of amniotes that have a rich fossil record that extends back to the Late Triassic, but little is known about global patterns of disparity through time. We here investigate the cranial disparity of 172 representatives of the turtle lineage and their ancestors grouped into 20 time bins ranging from the Late Triassic until the Recent using two-dimensional geometric morphometrics. Three evolutionary phases are apparent in all three anatomical views investigated. In the first phase, disparity increases gradually from the Late Triassic to the Palaeogene with only a minor perturbation at the K/T extinct event. Although global warming may have influenced this increase, we find the Mesozoic fragmentation of Pangaea to be a more plausible factor. Following its maximum, disparity decreases strongly towards the Miocene, only to recover partially towards the Recent. The marked collapse in disparity is likely a result of habitat destruction caused by global drying, combined with the homogenization of global turtle faunas that resulted from increased transcontinental dispersal in the Tertiary. The disparity minimum in the Miocene is likely an artefact of poor sampling.

| S-EPMC5136591 | biostudies-literature

Monkeypox virus: a neglected zoonotic pathogen spreads globally.

Project description: Not available

| S-EPMC9297671 | biostudies-literature

Influences of dominance and evolution of sex in finite diploid populations.

Project description:Most eukaryotes reproduce sexually. Although the benefits of sex in diploids mainly stem from recombination and segregation, the relative effects of recombination and segregation are relatively less known. In this study, we adopt an infinite loci model to illustrate how dominance coefficient of mutations affects the above-mentioned genetic events. However, we assume mutational effects to be independent and also ignore the effects of epistasis within loci. Our simulations show that with different levels of dominance, segregation and recombination may play different roles. In particular, recombination more commonly has a major impact on the evolution of sex when deleterious mutations are partially recessive. In contrast, when deleterious mutations are dominant, segregation becomes more important than recombination, a finding that is consistent with previous studies stating that segregation, rather than recombination, is more likely to drive the evolution of sex. Moreover, beneficial mutations alone remarkably increases the effects of recombination. We also note that populations favor sexual reproduction when deleterious mutations become more dominant or beneficial mutations become more recessive. Overall, these results illustrate that the existence of dominance is an important mechanism that affects the evolution of sex.

| S-EPMC4444274 | biostudies-literature

The evolution of recombination rates in finite populations during ecological speciation.

Project description:Recombination can impede ecological speciation with gene flow by mixing locally adapted genotypes with maladapted migrant genotypes from a divergent population. In such a scenario, suppression of recombination can be selectively favoured. However, in finite populations evolving under the influence of random genetic drift, recombination can also facilitate adaptation by reducing Hill-Robertson interference between loci under selection. In this case, increased recombination rates can be favoured. Although these two major effects on recombination have been studied individually, their joint effect on ecological speciation with gene flow remains unexplored. Using a mathematical model, we investigated the evolution of recombination rates in two finite populations that exchange migrants while adapting to contrasting environments. Our results indicate a two-step dynamic where increased recombination is first favoured (in response to the Hill-Robertson effect), and then disfavoured, as the cost of recombining locally with maladapted migrant genotypes increases over time (the maladaptive gene flow effect). In larger populations, a stronger initial benefit for recombination was observed, whereas high migration rates intensify the long-term cost of recombination. These dynamics may have important implications for our understanding of the conditions that facilitate incipient speciation with gene flow and the evolution of recombination in finite populations.

| S-EPMC5095376 | biostudies-literature

Transcatheter Mitral Valve Replacement: slow and steady progress.

Project description: Not available

| S-EPMC6036048 | biostudies-literature

Relative effects of segregation and recombination on the evolution of sex in finite diploid populations.

Project description:The mechanism of reproducing more viable offspring in response to selection is a major factor influencing the advantages of sex. In diploids, sexual reproduction combines genotype by recombination and segregation. Theoretical studies of sexual reproduction have investigated the advantage of recombination in haploids. However, the potential advantage of segregation in diploids is less studied. This study aimed to quantify the relative contribution of recombination and segregation to the evolution of sex in finite diploids by using multilocus simulations. The mean fitness of a sexually or asexually reproduced population was calculated to describe the long-term effects of sex. The evolutionary fate of a sex or recombination modifier was also monitored to investigate the short-term effects of sex. Two different scenarios of mutations were considered: (1) only deleterious mutations were present and (2) a combination of deleterious and beneficial mutations. Results showed that the combined effects of segregation and recombination strongly contributed to the evolution of sex in diploids. If deleterious mutations were only present, segregation efficiently slowed down the speed of Muller's ratchet. As the recombination level was increased, the accumulation of deleterious mutations was totally inhibited and recombination substantially contributed to the evolution of sex. The presence of beneficial mutations evidently increased the fixation rate of a recombination modifier. We also observed that the twofold cost of sex was easily to overcome in diploids if a sex modifier caused a moderate frequency of sex.

| S-EPMC3833686 | biostudies-literature

Sperm competitiveness in frogs: slow and steady wins the race.

Project description:When sperm compete to fertilize available ova, selection is expected to favour ejaculate traits that contribute to a male's fertilization success. While there is much evidence to show that selection favours increased numbers of sperm, only a handful of empirical studies have examined how variation in sperm form and function contributes to competitive fertilization success. Here, we examine selection acting on sperm form and function in the externally fertilizing myobatrachid frog, Crinia georgiana. Using in vitro fertilization techniques and controlling for variation in the number of sperm contributed by males in competitive situations, we show that males with a greater proportion of motile sperm, and motile sperm with slower swimming velocities, have an advantage when competing for fertilizations. Sperm morphology and the degree of genetic similarity between putative sires and the female had no influence on competitive fertilization success. These unusual patterns of selection might explain why frog sperm typically exhibit relatively slow swimming speeds and sustained longevity.

| S-EPMC2825793 | biostudies-literature

African Swine Fever: Fast and Furious or Slow and Steady?

Project description:Since the introduction of African swine fever (ASF) into Georgia in 2007, the disease has been spreading in an unprecedented way. Many countries that are still free from the disease fear the emergence of ASF in their territory either in domestic pigs or in wild boar. In the past, ASF was often described as being a highly contagious disease with mortality often up to 100%. However, the belief that the disease might enter a naïve population and rapidly affect the entire susceptible population needs to be critically reviewed. The current ASF epidemic in wild boar, but also the course of ASF within outbreaks in domestic pig holdings, suggest a constant, but relatively slow spread. Moreover, the results of several experimental and field studies support the impression that the spread of ASF is not always fast. ASF spread and its speed depend on various factors concerning the host, the virus, and also the environment. Many of these factors and their effects are not fully understood. For this review, we collated published information regarding the spreading speed of ASF and the factors that are deemed to influence the speed of ASF spread and tried to clarify some issues and open questions in this respect.

| S-EPMC6783890 | biostudies-literature

How best can finite-time social distancing reduce epidemic final size?

Project description:Given maximal social distancing duration and intensity, how can one minimize the epidemic final size, or equivalently the total number of individuals infected during the outbreak? A complete answer to this question is provided and demonstrated here for the SIR epidemic model. In this simplified setting, the optimal solution consists in enforcing the highest confinement level during the longest allowed period, beginning at a time instant that is the unique solution to certain 1D optimization problem. Based on this result, we present numerical essays showing the best possible performance for a large set of basic reproduction numbers and lockdown durations and intensities.

| S-EPMC7833531 | biostudies-literature

OmicsDI is part of the ELIXIR infrastructure

OmicsDI is an Elixir interoperability service. Learn more ›

Tweets

OmicsDI Databases

PRIDE
PeptideAtlas
MassIVE
JPOST Repository
Physiome Model Repository

EGA
EVA
ENA
LINCS
PAXDB
Cell Collective

MetaboLights
Metabolomics Workbench
MetabolomeExpress
GNPS
BioModels
FAIRDOMHub

ArrayExpress
dbGaP
ExpressionAtlas
GEO
NODE

Information

Databases
Help
API
Contact us
Code on GitHub
Terms of use
Submit Data