We propose a numerical approach to study the invasion fitness of a mutant and to determine evolutionary singular strategies in evolutionary structured models in which the competitive exclusion principle holds. Our approach is based on a dual representation, which consists of the modeling of the small size mutant population by a stochastic model and the computation of its corresponding deterministic model. The use of the deterministic model greatly facilitates the numerical determination of the feasibility of invasion as well as the convergence-stability of the evolutionary singular strategy. Our approach combines standard adaptive dynamics with the link between the mutant survival criterion in the stochastic model and the sign of the eigenvalue in the corresponding deterministic model. We present our method in the context of a mass-structured individual-based chemostat model. We exploit a previously derived mathematical relationship between stochastic and deterministic representations of the mutant population in the chemostat model to derive a general numerical method for analyzing the invasion fitness in the stochastic models. Our method can be applied to the broad class of evolutionary models for which a link between the stochastic and deterministic invasion fitnesses can be established. (C) 2017 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

We investigate the coevolution of cannibalistic predators and timid prey, which seek refuge upon detecting a predator. To understand how the species affect each other’s evolution, we derived the ecological model from individual-level processes using ordinary differential equations. The ecological dynamics exhibit bistability between equilibrium and periodic attractors, which may disappear through catastrophic bifurcations. Using the critical function analysis of adaptive dynamics, we classify general trade-offs between cannibalism and prey capture that produce different evolutionary outcomes. The evolutionary analysis reveals several ways in which cannibalism emerges as a response to timidity of the prey. The long-term coevolution either attains a singularity, or becomes cyclic through two mechanisms: genetical cycles through Hopf bifurcation of the singularity, or ecogenetical cycles involving abrupt switching between ecological attractors. Further diversification of cannibalism occurs through evolutionary branching, which is predicted to be delayed when simultaneous prey evolution is necessary for the singularity’s attainability. We conclude that predator-prey coevolution produces a variety of outcomes, in which evolutionary cycles are commonplace.

We investigate the evolution of timidity in a prey species whose predator has cannibalistic tendencies. The ecological model is derived from individual-level processes, in which the prey seeks refuge after detecting a predator, and the predator cannibalises on the conspecific juveniles. Bifurcation analysis of the model reveals ecological bistability between equilibrium and periodic attractors. Using the framework of adaptive dynamics, we classify ten qualitatively different evolutionary scenarios induced by the ecological bistability. These scenarios include ecological attractor switching through catastrophic bifurcations, which can reverse the direction of evolution. We show that such reversals often result in evolutionary cycling of the level of timidity. In the absence of cannibalism, the model never exhibits ecological bistability nor evolutionary cycling. We conclude that cannibalistic predator behaviour can completely change both the ecological dynamics and the evolution of prey. (C) 2019 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd.

Resources invested in dispersal structures as well as time and energy spent during transfer may often decrease fecundity. Here we analyse an extended version of the Hamilton-May model of dispersal evolution, where we include a fecundity-dispersal trade-off and also mortality between competition and reproduction. With adaptive dynamics and critical function analysis we investigate the evolution of dispersal strategies and ask whether adaptive diversification is possible. We exclude evolutionary branching for concave trade-offs and show that for convex trade-offs diversification is promoted in a narrow parameter range. We provide theoretical evidence that dispersal strategies can monotonically decrease with increasing survival during dispersal. Moreover, we illustrate the existence of two alternative attracting dispersal strategies. The model exhibits fold bifurcation points where slight changes in survival can lead to evolutionary catastrophes. (C) 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

We study the adaptive dynamics of the colonization rate of species living in a patchy habitat when there is a trade-off with the competitive strength for individual patches. To that end, we formulate a continuous-time competition-colonization model that also includes ownership effects as well as random disturbance affecting the mortality rate. We find that intermediate disturbance (as measured by the fluctuation intensity of the mortality rate), a strong competition-colonization trade-off, and a weak ownership effect are necessary conditions for evolutionary branching and hence for the emergence of polymorphisms (i.e., coexistence) by small evolutionary steps. Specifically, concerning ownership we find that with low-intermediate disturbance, a weak ownership advantage favours evolutionary branching while ownership disadvantage does not. This asymmetry disappears at the higher-intermediate disturbance. Moreover, at a low-intermediate disturbance, the effect of the strength of the competition-colonization trade-off on evolutionary branching is non-monotonic disappears because the possibility of branching disappears again when the trade-off is too strong. We also find that there can be multiple evolutionary attractors for polymorphic populations, each with its own basin of attraction. With small but non-zero random evolutionary steps and depending on the initial polymorphic condition just after branching, a coevolutionary trajectory may come arbitrarily close to the shared boundary of two such basins and may even jump from one side to the other, which can lead to various kinds of long-term evolutionary dynamics, including evolutionary branching-extinction cycles. (C) 2021 The Author(s). Published by Elsevier Ltd.

Evolutionary suicide is a riveting phenomenon in which adaptive evolution drives a viable population to extinction. Gyllenberg and Parvinen (Bull Math Biol 63(5):981-993, 2001) showed that, in a wide class of deterministic population models, a discontinuous transition to extinction is a necessary condition for evolutionary suicide. An implicit assumption of their proof is that the invasion fitness of a rare strategy is well-defined also in the extinction state of the population. Epidemic models with frequency-dependent incidence, which are often used to model the spread of sexually transmitted infections or the dynamics of infectious diseases within herds, violate this assumption. In these models, evolutionary suicide can occur through a non-catastrophic bifurcation whereby pathogen adaptation leads to a continuous decline of host (and consequently pathogen) population size to zero. Evolutionary suicide of pathogens with frequency-dependent transmission can occur in two ways, with pathogen strains evolving either higher or lower virulence.

Empirical studies of dispersal indicate that decisions to immigrate are patch-type dependent; yet theoretical models usually ignore this fact. Here, we investigate the evolution of patch-type dependent immigration of a population inhabiting and dispersing in a heterogeneous landscape, which is structured by patches of low and high reward. We model the decision to immigrate in detail from a mechanistic underpinning. With the methods of adaptive dynamics, we derive both analytical and numerical results for the evolution of immigration when life-history traits are patch-type dependent. The model exhibits evolutionary branching in a wide parameter range and the subsequent coevolution can lead to a stable coexistence of a generalist, settling in patches of any type, and a specialist that only immigrates into patches of high reward. We find that individuals always settle in the patches of high reward, in which survival until maturation, relative fecundity and emigration probability are high. We investigate how the probability to immigrate into patches of low reward changes with model parameters. For example, we show that immigration into patches of low reward increases when the emigration probability in these patches increases. Further, immigration into patches of low reward decreases when the patches of high reward become less safe during the dispersal season. (C) 2016 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

To better understand the environmental factors and ecological processes underlying the evolution of the irreversible transition from a free-swimming state to an immobile sessile state as seen in many aquatic invertebrates, we study the adaptive dynamics of the settling rate of a hypothetical microorganism onto the wall of a chemostat. The two states, floating or settled, differ in their nutrient ingestion, reproduction and death rate. We consider three different settling mechanisms involving competition for space on the wall: (i) purely exploitative competition where free-swimming individuals settle in vacant space only, (ii) mixed exploitative and interference competition where individuals attempt to settle in any place but fail and die if the space is already occupied, and (iii) mixed exploitative and interference competition, but now settling in occupied space is successful and the former occupant dies. In the simplified environment of the chemostat, the input concentration of nutrients and the dilution rate of the tank are the main environmental control variables. Using the theory of adaptive dynamics, we find that the settling mechanisms and environmental control variables have qualitatively different effects on the evolution of the settling rate in terms of the direction of evolution as well as on species diversity. In the case of purely exploitative competition a small change in the settings of the environmental control variables can lead to an abrupt reversal of the direction of evolution, while in the case of mixed exploitative and interference competition the effect is gradual. For all three settling mechanisms, periodic fluctuations in the nutrient input open the possibility of evolutionary branching leading to the long-term coexistence of an intermediate and an infinitely high settling rates (in the case of low-frequency fluctuations), and an intermediate and a zero settling rates (in the case of high-frequency fluctuations). (C) 2021 The Author(s). Published by Elsevier Ltd.