title: Evolutionary game theory: molecules as players.
abstract: In this and an accompanying paper we review the use of game theoretical concepts in cell biology and molecular biology. This review focuses on the subcellular level by considering viruses, genes, and molecules as players. We discuss in which way catalytic RNA can be treated by game theory. Moreover, genes can compete for success in replication and can have different strategies in interactions with other genetic elements. Also transposable elements, or "jumping genes", can act as players because they usually bear different traits or strategies. Viruses compete in the case of co-infecting a host cell. Proteins interact in a game theoretical sense when forming heterodimers. Finally, we describe how the Shapley value can be applied to enzymes in metabolic pathways. We show that game theory can be successfully applied to describe and analyse scenarios at the molecular level resulting in counterintuitive conclusions.
authors.affiliation: Friedrich-Schiller-University Jena, Faculty of Biology and Pharmacy, Department of Bioinformatics, Ernst-Abbe-Platz 2, 07743 Jena, Germany. stefan.schu@uni-jena.de.
authors.forename: Katrin
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Bohl
authors.forename: Sabine
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Hummert
authors.forename: Sarah
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Werner
authors.forename: David
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Basanta
authors.forename: Andreas
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Deutsch
authors.forename: Stefan
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Schuster
authors.forename: Günter
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Theissen
authors.forename: Anja
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Schroeter
mesh_terms: D000483:Alleles; D005075:Biological Evolution; D004251:DNA Transposable Elements / Q000235:genetics; D005716:Game Theory; D005796:Genes; D018392:Genomic Imprinting; D053858:Metabolic Networks and Pathways / Q000235:genetics; D008954:Models, Biological; D011506:Proteins; D016337:RNA, Catalytic; D014780:Viruses / Q000235:genetics
chemical_list: D004251:DNA Transposable Elements; D011506:Proteins; D016337:RNA, Catalytic