Population structure reverses selection of variants with proportionally scaled birth and death rates.

ABSTRACT: A widespread biological phenomenon is that higher reproduction rates are often accompanied by higher mortality. During tumor progression, variants can both reproduce and die faster; rapidly replicating viruses decay more quickly; arthropods with faster reproduction have shorter lifespans; and in ecological systems, more frequent reproduction can increase predation risk. Variants with proportionally scaled birth and death rates are termed quasi-neutral mutants. Although their lifetime reproductive success is unchanged, such mutants have fixation probabilities slightly lower (or higher) than neutral mutants if birth and death rates are proportionally larger (or smaller). Previous studies, limited to well-mixed populations, showed that quasi-neutral mutants deviate from neutrality but still e

SUBMITTER: Komarova NL 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC12783849 | biostudies-literature | 2025 Dec

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature