title: Small world effects in evolution.
abstract: For asexual organisms point mutations correspond to local displacements in the genotypic space, while other genotypic rearrangements represent long-range jumps. We investigate the spreading properties of an initially homogeneous population in a flat fitness landscape, and the equilibrium properties on a smooth fitness landscape. We show that a small-world effect is present: even a small fraction of quenched long-range jumps makes the results indistinguishable from those obtained by assuming all mutations equiprobable. Moreover, we find that the equilibrium distribution is a Boltzmann one, in which the fitness plays the role of an energy, and mutations that of a temperature.
authors.affiliation: Dipartimento di Matematica Applicata, Università di Firenze, Via S. Marta, 3 I-50139 Firenze, Italy. bagnoli@dma.unifi.it
authors.forename: F
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Bagnoli
authors.forename: M
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Bezzi
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D005075:Biological Evolution; D003198:Computer Simulation; D017753:Ecosystem; D019143:Evolution, Molecular; D014644:Genetic Variation / Q000235:genetics*; D005828:Genetics, Population; D006801:Humans; D008957:Models, Genetic; D009154:Mutation / Q000235:genetics*; D010802:Phylogeny; D012641:Selection, Genetic; D013045:Species Specificity