Effects of epistasis on infectivity range during host-parasite coevolution.

ABSTRACT: Understanding how parasites adapt to changes in host resistance is crucial to evolutionary epidemiology. Experimental studies have demonstrated that parasites are more capable of adapting to gradual, rather than sudden changes in host phenotype, as the latter may require multiple mutations that are unlikely to arise simultaneously. A key, but as yet unexplored factor is precisely how interactions between mutations (epistasis) affect parasite evolution. Here, we investigate this phenomenon in the context of infectivity range, where parasites may experience selection to infect broader sets of genotypes. When epistasis is strongly positive, we find that parasites are unlikely to evolve broader infectivity ranges if hosts exhibit sudden, rather than gradual changes in phenotype, in close agree

SUBMITTER: Ashby B 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4261995 | biostudies-literature | 2014 Oct

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature