Fitness versus Longevity in AgeStructured Population Dynamics.pdfVIP

Fitness versus Longevity in Age-Structured Population Dynamics W. Hwang, P. L. Krapivsky, and S. Redner Center for BioDynamics, Center for Polymer Studies, and Department of Physics, Boston University, Boston, MA 02215 We examine the dynamics of an age-structured population model in which the life expectancy of an offspring may be mutated with respect to that of the parent. While the total population of the system always reaches a steady state, the fitness and age characteristics exhibit counter- intuitive behavior as a function of the mutational bias. By analytical and numerical study of the underlying rate equations, we show that if deleterious mutations are favored, the average fitness of the population reaches a steady state, while the average population age is a decreasing function of the overall fitness. When advantageous mutations are favored, the average population fitness grows linearly with time t, while the average age is independent of fitness. For no mutational bias, the 9 average fitness grows as t2/3 . 9 9 I. INTRODUCTION fit, competition plays a more prominent role and is the 1 primary mechanism that leads to premature mortality. c e The goal of this paper is to understand the role of mu- fitness D tations on the evolution of fitness and age characteristics of individuals in a simple age-structured population dy- n+1 b 6