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Evolution in alternating environments with tunable interlandscape correlations.

Jeff Maltas1, Douglas M McNally2, Kevin B Wood1,3

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Summary
This summary is machine-generated.

Cycling between environments can alter evolutionary fitness. Switching between correlated fitness landscapes can increase or decrease a population's fitness, depending on landscape ruggedness and correlation.

Keywords:
AdaptationEpistasisFitnessModels/SimulationsPopulation GeneticsSelection-Natural

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Area of Science:

  • Evolutionary biology
  • Theoretical ecology

Background:

  • Natural populations face temporally varying environments.
  • Understanding evolutionary dynamics under changing selection pressures is crucial but challenging.

Purpose of the Study:

  • Investigate how cycling between statistically related fitness landscapes impacts the evolved fitness of asexual populations.
  • Analyze the effects of landscape ruggedness and interlandscape correlation on evolutionary outcomes.

Main Methods:

  • Constructed pairs of fitness landscapes with tunable correlations.
  • Simulated asexual population evolution across these landscape pairs.
  • Analyzed steady-state fitness relative to single-environment evolution.

Main Results:

  • Switching between landscapes can increase or decrease steady-state fitness.
  • Rugged landscapes with switching often select for increased fitness, even if anticorrelated.
  • Positively correlated landscapes facilitate overcoming local fitness maxima.
  • Anticorrelated landscapes can lead to ergodic dynamics and reduced fitness.

Conclusions:

  • Environmental variability, specifically cycling between fitness landscapes, significantly influences evolutionary trajectories and outcomes.
  • The correlation structure and ruggedness of fitness landscapes are key determinants of adaptation.
  • Switching between environments can be a powerful evolutionary force, with outcomes dependent on landscape properties.