Competing metabolic strategies in a multilevel selection model

Abstract

The evolutionary mechanisms of energy efficiency have been addressed. One important question is to understand how the optimized usage of energy can be selected in an evolutionary process, especially when the immediate advantage of gathering efficient individuals in an energetic context is not clear. We propose a model of two competing metabolic strategies differing in their resource usage, an efficient strain which converts resource into energy at high efficiency but displays a low rate of resource consumption, and an inefficient strain which consumes resource at a high rate but at low yield. We explore the dynamics in both well-mixed and structured populations. The selection for optimized energy usage is measured by the likelihood that an efficient strain can invade a population of inefficient strains. It is found that the parameter space at which the efficient strain can thrive in structured populations is always broader than observed in well-mixed populations.

The influence of the composition of tradeoffs on the generation of differentiated cells

“…The evolution of tradeos is an issue of intense debate in the current literature as tradeos have played a central role in shaping life histories and ecological/evolutionary dynamics in nature [1]. It has been addressed in the context of distinct frameworks such as evolutionary game theory [2][3][4][5], resource-based modeling [6][7][8][9], developmental plasticity [10,11], and so on. It is believed that much of the observed biodiversity on Earth stems from the existence of tradeos [12].…”

Making ATP fast and slow: do yeasts play a mixed strategy to metabolise glucose?

“…Studying the alternative metabolic strategies have been a rather fruitful enterprise. 271 Generally, different strategies are treated as distinct "strain" that do compete for a 272 shared resource (e.g., see [22]). This approach simplifies the problem and allows to treat 273 the problem similar to studying the invasion and fixation of mutant strain in well-mixed 274 and structured populations.…”