Spatial structure and Lamarckian adaptation explain extreme genetic diversity at CRISPR locus
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Updated: May 20, 2026

Site-Directed φC31-Mediated Integration and Cassette Exchange in Anopheles Vectors of Malaria
Published on: February 2, 2021
1Center for Models of Life, Niels Bohr Institute, University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark. haerter@nbi.dk
Abstract:
Even within similar bacterial strains, it has been found that the clustered, regularly interspaced short palindromic repeat (CRISPR) shows a large variability of spacers. Modeling bacterial strains with different levels of immunity to infection by a single virulent phage, we find that coexistence in a well-mixed environment is possible only when these levels are distinctly different. When bacterial strains are similar, one subpopulation collapses. In the case of bacteria with various levels of CRISPR immunity to a range of phages, small differences in spacer composition will accordingly be suppressed under well-mixed conditions. Using a numerical model of populations spreading in space, we predict that it is the Lamarckian nature of CRISPR evolution that combines with spatial correlations to sustain the experimentally observed distribution of spacer diversity.
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