Chalmers Conferences, 9th European Conference on Mathematical and Theoretical Biology

A resource-based model of multi-species competitions under mutations
Weini Huang

Last modified: 2014-03-28

Abstract


The coexistence of many species under the availability of a small number of resources is an openĀ and intriguing issue in theoretical ecology. To investigate this question, we propose a resource-based model of multi-species competitions. For an evolving community with unfixed number of species, we use a Monod-like function to describe the capability of a species to make use of the resources. Then, we define the inter-specific and intra-specific competition based on their capabilities of using these resources, and write them down in the form of a payoff matrix. This payoff matrix is dynamical in two aspects. First, the payoff entries describing the competitions may change in any time, because the capability of a species using a certain resources fluctuates with the availability of this resource and the number of individuals using it. Second, the number of species (corresponding to the columns and lines in the payoff matrix) can increase or decrease under mutations and extinctions. These two aspects of our model may contribute to study the evolution of species diversity in a community from an adaptive perspective. We look at the species dynamics under both neutral and strong selection. Our results show that frequency dependent interaction can lead to a high species diversity under limited number of resources.


Keywords


Species diversity, random mutations, Community evolution, Evolutionary game theory