Joint evolution of specialization and dispersal in structured metapopulations

Tuomas Nurmi (1) , Kalle Parvinen (1)

1 Department of Mathematics

We study the joint evolution of dispersal and specialization concerning resource usage in a mechanistically underpinned structured discrete-time metapopulation model. We show that dispersal significantly affects the evolution of specialization and that specialization is a key factor that determines the possibility of evolutionary branching in dispersal propensity. Allowing both dispersal propensity and specialization to evolve as a consequence of natural selection is necessary in order to understand the evolutionary dynamics. The joint evolution of dispersal and specialization forms a natural evolutionary path leading to the coexistence of generalists and specialists. We show that in this process, the number of different patch types and the resource distribution are essential.

Mots clés: Adaptive dynamics; Dispersal; Specialization; Trade-off; Specialist; Generalist; Evolution; Metapopulation

Domaines: Sciences du Vivant [q-bio]

Tuomas Nurmi, Kalle Parvinen. Joint evolution of specialization and dispersal in structured metapopulations. Journal of Theoretical Biology, 2011, 275 (1), pp.78. ⟨10.1016/j.jtbi.2011.01.023⟩. ⟨hal-00676100⟩