title: Long-range interactions and evolutionary stability in a predator-prey system.
abstract: Evolving ecosystems often are dominated by spatially local dynamics, but many also include long-range transport that mixes spatially separated groups. The existence of such mixing may be of critical importance since research shows spatial separation may be responsible for long-term stability of predator-prey systems. Complete mixing results in rapid global extinction, while spatial systems achive long term stability due to an inhomogeneous spatial pattern of local extinctions. We consider the robustness of a generic evolving predator-prey or host-pathogen model to long-range mixing and find a transition to global extinction at nontrivial values implying that even if significant mixing already exists, a small amount of additional mixing may cause extinction. Our results are relevant to the global mixing of species due to human intervention and to global transport of infectious disease.
authors.affiliation: MIT Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory, 32 Vassar St., Cambridge, Massachusetts 02139, USA.
authors.forename: Erik M
authors.initials: EM
authors.lastname: Rauch
authors.forename: Yaneer
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Bar-Yam
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D005075:Biological Evolution; D003163:Competitive Behavior / Q000502:physiology*; D003198:Computer Simulation; D017753:Ecosystem; D020387:Food Chain; D005716:Game Theory; D014644:Genetic Variation; D005828:Genetics, Population; D006801:Humans; D008954:Models, Biological; D011157:Population Dynamics; D011235:Predatory Behavior / Q000502:physiology*; D015996:Survival Rate; D013997:Time Factors