Developmental stability and fitness: the evidence is not quite so clear

Article Abstract:

Much of the data touted to support a positive relationship between developmental stability and various fitness components fail to do so. Such failure is traced to a lack of focus on the relationships being investigated. Many of the studies cited are ambivalent and do not offer any conclusive evidence. The use of a vote-counting procedure to assess whether there is a clear relationship between developmental stability and fitness is invalid, as it failed to reject the null hypothesis that, on average, half of the studies will show an effect in the expected direction.

Developmental biology, Growth, Growth (Physiology)

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Chaos in a noisy world: new methods and evidence from time-series analysis

Article Abstract:

Time-series models based on stability and degree of predictability enable quantification and detection of chaos in randomly perturbed population-dynamic systems. The response surface method can be applied to data sets with less population, while the feedforward neural networks help estimate chaos in greater data sets. The Lyapunov exponent and the relative strength of exogenous endogenous factors exhibit a positive correlation and characterize chaos.

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Updating Gillespie with controlled chaos

Article Abstract:

Chaos theory, in combination with Gillespie's notion that offspring variance decreases fitness in natural selection, suggests higher moments of the distribution of offspring numbers can also affect the course of evolution. The effect of these higher moments allows phenotypes capable of controlling their chaotic dynamics to have an advantage over the uncontrolled, transforming a chaotic situation into a state of stable equilibrium.

Analysis, Natural history, Natural selection, Variation (Biology)

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