On prisoners and cells
Article Abstract:
Research in mathematical biology has yielded a new way of looking at the Prisoner's Dilemma model for the evolution of altruistic versus self-centered behavior. This model illustrates the incompatibility of these behaviors by evoking the image of two prisoners who can achieve a common goal either by working individually or together. Martin A. Nowak and Robert M. May have put forward a revised model in which cooperators flourish better than defectors through contact with other cooperators. Nowak and May also show that cellular automata may lead to the spatial modeling of evolution.
Publication Name: Nature
Subject: Zoology and wildlife conservation
ISSN: 0028-0836
Year: 1992
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Phage-lift for game theory
Article Abstract:
A virus exploits the vital functions of a host cell and viruses also exploit each other. Turner and Chao have shown that certain viruses that infect bacteria, or phages, can actually engage in the prisoner's dilemma, the trap between cooperation and non-cooperation. The prisoner's dilemma was developed by game theorists just 50 years ago and computer simulations and the study of real-life occurrences of the prisoner's dilemma expanded areas of research.
Publication Name: Nature
Subject: Zoology and wildlife conservation
ISSN: 0028-0836
Year: 1999
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Merging lines and emerging levels
Article Abstract:
A scientific meeting has been told that mathematics can help solve many biological problems, even though they are not seen as natural partners. A workshop attended by mathematicians and evolutionary biologists at the Ecole Normale Superieure in Paris, France, reflects a significant trend towards biomathematics because chemistry has been unable to solve many basic problems, such as the merger of lineages and the coevolution of hosts and parasites.
Publication Name: Nature
Subject: Zoology and wildlife conservation
ISSN: 0028-0836
Year: 1998
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- Abstracts: Volcanic winter and accelerated glaciation following the Toba super-eruption. Explosive start to last ice age
- Abstracts: A march of genetic maps. More from the modellers. A welcome animal model
- Abstracts: Merck promises large grant to university if Canada extends patent protection. Canada's cod leaves science in hot water
- Abstracts: Progress by poisoning. Fast forward to fusion. Tetanus and botulinum-B neurotoxins block neurotransmitter release by proteolytic cleavage of synaptobrevin