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Talk

Outcrossing overcomes the Error Catastrophe

  • Michael Lachmann (MPI MiS, Leipzig)
A3 02 (Seminar room)

Abstract

The error catastrophe states that when selection is weaker than mutation, the population will do a random walk in genotype space. A similar version can be formulated for environmental changes: when selection is weaker than the rate at which the environment changes, the population will again do a random walk in genotype space. I will show that an outcrossing population can overcome this version of the error catastrophe - no matter how weak the selection pressure, an outcrossing population can track the environment, if the population size is sufficient.