Biology – Quantitative Biology – Populations and Evolution
Scientific paper
2011-04-14
Biology
Quantitative Biology
Populations and Evolution
18 pages, 3 figures, glossary. Accepted in Trend in Ecology and Evolution (to appear in print in August 2011)
Scientific paper
10.1016/j.tree.2011.04.002
Evolutionary biology shares many concepts with statistical physics: both deal with populations, whether of molecules or organisms, and both seek to simplify evolution in very many dimensions. Often, methodologies have undergone parallel and independent development, as with stochastic methods in population genetics. We discuss aspects of population genetics that have embraced methods from physics: amongst others, non-equilibrium statistical mechanics, travelling waves, and Monte-Carlo methods have been used to study polygenic evolution, rates of adaptation, and range expansions. These applications indicate that evolutionary biology can further benefit from interactions with other areas of statistical physics, for example, by following the distribution of paths taken by a population through time.
Barton Nick H.
de Vladar Harold P.
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