Effects of Phenotypic Variation on Evolutionary Dynamics

Phenotypic variation among clones (individuals with identical genes, i.e. isogenic individuals) has been recognized both theoretically and experimentally. We investigate the effects of phenotypic variation on evolutionary dynamics of a population. In a population, the individuals are assumed to be haploid with two genotypes: one genotype shows phenotypic variation and the other does not. We use an individual-based Moran model in which the individuals reproduce according to their fitness values and die at random. The evolutionary dynamics of an individual-based model is formulated in terms of a master equation and is approximated as the Fokker-Planck equation (FPE) and the coupled non-linear stochastic differential equations (SDEs) with multiplicative noise. We first analyze the deterministic part of the SDEs to obtain the fixed points and determine the stability of each fixed point. We find that there is a discrete phase transition in the population distribution when the probability of reproducing the fitter individual is equal to the critical value determined by the stability of the fixed points. Next, we take demographic stochasticity into account and analyze the FPE by eliminating the fast variable to reduce the coupled two-variable FPE to the single-variable FPE. We derive a quasi-stationary distribution of the reduced FPE and predict the fixation probabilities and the mean fixation times to absorbing states. We also carry out numerical simulations in the form of the Gillespie algorithm and find that the results of simulations are consistent with the analytic predictions.