Evolutionary suicide is an evolutionary phenomenon in which the process of
adaptation causes the population to become
extinct. For example, individuals might be selected to switch from eating mature plants to seedlings, and thereby deplete their food plant's population. Selection on individuals can theoretically produce adaptations that threaten the survival of the population.
Much of the research on evolutionary suicide has used the
mathematical modeling technique
adaptive dynamics, in which genetic changes are studied together with
population dynamics. This allows the model to predict how
population density
Population density (in agriculture: Stock (disambiguation), standing stock or plant density) is a measurement of population per unit land area. It is mostly applied to humans, but sometimes to other living organisms too. It is a key geographical ...
will change as a given
trait invades the population.
Evolutionary suicide has also been referred to as "Darwinian extinction", "runaway selection to self-extinction", and "evolutionary collapse". The idea is similar in concept to the
tragedy of the commons
Tragedy (from the grc-gre, τραγῳδία, ''tragōidia'', ''tragōidia'') is a genre of drama based on human suffering and, mainly, the terrible or sorrowful events that befall a main character. Traditionally, the intention of tragedy i ...
and the
Tendency of the rate of profit to fall, namely that they are all examples of an accumulation of individual changes leading to a collective disaster such that it negates those individual changes.
Many adaptations have apparently negative effects on population dynamics, for example infanticide by male lions, or the production of toxins by bacteria. However, empirically establishing that an extinction event was unambiguously caused by the process of adaptation is not a trivial task.
See also
*
Fisherian runaway
*
Sexual selection § Geometric progression
* ''
The Limits to Growth
''The Limits to Growth'' (''LTG'') is a 1972 report that discussed the possibility of exponential economic and population growth with finite supply of resources, studied by computer simulation. The study used the World3 computer model to simula ...
''
References and external links
{{reflist
* Gyllenberg, M. & K. Parvinen. 2001. Necessary and sufficient conditions for evolutionary suicide. ''
Bulletin of Mathematical Biology'' 63, 981–993, doi:10.1006/bulm.2001.0253
* Gyllenberg, M., K. Parvinen & U. Dieckmann. 2002
Evolutionary suicide and evolution of dispersal in structured metapopulations ''J. Math. Biol.'' 45, 79–105 (IIASA Interim Report IR-00-056)
* Nagy, J.D., E.M. Victor and J.H. Cropper. 2007
Why don't all whales have cancer? A novel hypothesis resolving Peto's paradox ''Int. Comp. Biol.'' 47, 317–328
* Parvinen, K. 2005. Evolutionary suicide. ''Acta Biotheoretica'' 53, 241–264
* Rankin, D.J. & A. Lopez-Sepulcre. 2005
Can adaptation lead to extinction?''Oikos'' 111, 616–619
* Rankin, D.J., K. Bargum & H. Kokko. 2007
The tragedy of the commons in evolutionary biology ''Trends in Ecology and Evolution'' 22, 643–651
Evolutionary biology
Extinction