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Controlling the Mean Time to Extinction in Populations of Bacteria
Bhumika Thakur1, Hildegard Meyer-Ortmanns1,2
1School of Science, Constructor University, 28759 Bremen, Germany.
Entropy (Basel, Switzerland)
|May 27, 2023
Summary
Environmental changes and population dynamics impact bacterial extinction times. We found that extinction time depends non-monotonically on environmental change frequency, allowing control over population persistence.
Area of Science:
- Ecology
- Population Dynamics
- Theoretical Biology
Background:
- Ecological populations experience demographic fluctuations (births/deaths) and environmental changes.
- Understanding factors influencing population extinction is crucial in ecological studies.
Purpose of the Study:
- To analyze the impact of demographic fluctuations and environmental changes on the mean time to extinction for bacterial populations with two phenotypes.
- To explore the relationship between environmental change frequency and mean extinction time.
Main Methods:
- Gillespie simulations were employed to model population dynamics.
- The WKB approach was applied to classical stochastic systems in limiting cases.
Main Results:
- A non-monotonic dependence of the mean time to extinction on the frequency of environmental changes was observed.
- Dependencies on other system parameters were also investigated.
Conclusions:
- The mean time to extinction can be controlled by adjusting environmental change frequency and other system parameters.
- This control is relevant for managing bacterial populations, whether to promote or prevent their extinction, depending on ecological or host-organism perspectives.
Keywords:
Gillespie simulationsWKB approachdemographic noisedichotomous Markov processenvironmental fluctuationsmean time to extinctionnormals and persisterspopulation dynamicsMore Related Videos
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