Evolution of resource cycling in ecosystems and individuals.

ABSTRACT:

Background

Resource cycling is a defining process in the maintenance of the biosphere. Microbial communities, ranging from simple to highly diverse, play a crucial role in this process. Yet the evolutionary adaptation and speciation of micro-organisms have rarely been studied in the context of resource cycling. In this study, our basic questions are how does a community evolve its resource usage and how are resource cycles partitioned?

Results

We design a computational model in which a population of individuals evolves to take up nutrients and excrete waste. The waste of one individual is another's resource. Given a fixed amount of resources, this leads to resource cycles. We find that the shortest cycle dominates the ecological dynamics, and over evolutionary time its lengt

SUBMITTER: Crombach A 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC2698886 | biostudies-literature | 2009 Jun

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature