Eco-evolutionary dynamics of clonal multicellular life cycles

Area of Science:

• Evolutionary biology
• Theoretical ecology
• Origin of multicellularity

Background:

• Multicellular life cycles evolve through growth and fragmentation.
• Most models focus on internal group competition, ignoring inter-group interactions.
• Understanding life cycle evolution is key to the emergence of multicellularity.

Purpose of the Study:

• To model colonial life cycle evolution incorporating group interactions.
• To investigate how inter-group dynamics influence evolutionary outcomes.
• To compare model predictions with and without group interactions.

Main Methods:

• Development of a theoretical model for colonial life cycle evolution.
• Inclusion of inter-group interactions in evolutionary dynamics.
• Analysis of evolutionary stable strategies and population-level outcomes.

Main Results:

• Group interactions can lead to the coexistence of multiple life cycles.
• Evolutionary outcomes may depend on the initial population state.
• Evolutionary stable strategies remain restricted to binary fragmentation, similar to models without interactions.

Conclusions:

• Models neglecting group interactions provide an incomplete picture of life cycle evolution.
• Inter-group dynamics are essential for predicting long-term evolutionary trajectories.
• Considering group interactions reveals complex evolutionary scenarios not captured by simpler models.