Critical properties of complex fitness landscapes
2010 (English)In: Artificial Life XII: Proceedings of the 12th International Conference on the Synthesis and Simulation of Living Systems, ALIFE 2010, 2010, p. 126-132Conference paper (Refereed)
Abstract [en]
Evolutionary adaptation is the process that increases the fit of a population to the fitness landscape it inhabits. As a consequence, evolutionary dynamics is shaped, constrained, and channeled, by that fitness landscape. Much work has been expended to understand the evolutionary dynamics of adapting populations, but much less is known about the structure of the landscapes. Here, we study the global and local structure of complex fitness landscapes of interacting loci that describe protein folds or sets of interacting genes forming pathways or modules. We find that in these landscapes, high peaks are more likely to be found near other high peaks, corroborating Kauffman's "Massif Central" hypothesis. We study the clusters of peaks as a function of the ruggedness of the landscape and find that this clustering allows peaks to form interconnected networks. These networks undergo a percolation phase transition as a function of minimum peak height, which indicates that evolutionary trajectories that take no more than two mutations to shift from peak to peak can span the entire genetic space. These networks have implications for evolution in rugged landscapes, allowing adaptation to proceed after a local fitness peak has been ascended.
Place, publisher, year, edition, pages
2010. p. 126-132
Keywords [en]
Critical properties, Evolutionary adaptation, Evolutionary dynamics, Fitness landscape, Global and local structures, Interacting genes, Interconnected network, Local fitness, Peak height, Peak-to-peak, Percolation phase transition, Protein folds, Biological systems, Dynamics, Protein folding, Solvents, Health
National Category
Evolutionary Biology
Identifiers
URN: urn:nbn:se:du-37199Scopus ID: 2-s2.0-84859613567ISBN: 9780262290753 (print)OAI: oai:DiVA.org:du-37199DiVA, id: diva2:1557623
Conference
Artificial Life XII, Proceedings of the 12th International Conference on the Synthesis and Simulation of Living Systems, ALIFE 2010
2021-05-262021-05-262021-05-26Bibliographically approved