Quasispecies theory for finite populations

Details Quasispecies theory for finite populations Quasispecies theory for finite populations

2010-02-19

arxiv.org/abs/1002.3837v1

Phys. Rev. E 81 (2010) 011902

Biology

Quantitative Biology

Populations and Evolution

13 pages, 8 figures

Scientific paper

10.1103/PhysRevE.81.011902

We present stochastic, finite-population formulations of the Crow-Kimura and Eigen models of quasispecies theory, for fitness functions that depend in an arbitrary way on the number of mutations from the wild type. We include back mutations in our description. We show that the fluctuation of the population numbers about the average values are exceedingly large in these physical models of evolution. We further show that horizontal gene transfer reduces by orders of magnitude the fluctuations in the population numbers and reduces the accumulation of deleterious mutations in the finite population due to Muller's ratchet. Indeed the population sizes needed to converge to the infinite population limit are often larger than those found in nature for smooth fitness functions in the absence of horizontal gene transfer. These analytical results are derived for the steady-state by means of a field-theoretic representation. Numerical results are presented that indicate horizontal gene transfer speeds up the dynamics of evolution as well.

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