Department of Mathematics, Imperial College London, London, United Kingdom.
PLoS One. 2010 Nov 29;5(11):e14121. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0014121.
The act of cross-feeding whereby unrelated species exchange nutrients is a common feature of microbial interactions and could be considered a form of reciprocal altruism or reciprocal cooperation. Past theoretical work suggests that the evolution of cooperative cross-feeding in nature may be more challenging than for other types of cooperation. Here we re-evaluate a mathematical model used previously to study persistence of cross-feeding and conclude that the maintenance of cross-feeding interactions could be favoured for a larger parameter ranges than formerly observed. Strikingly, we also find that large populations of cross-feeders are not necessarily vulnerable to extinction from an initially small number of cheats who receive the benefit of cross-feeding but do not reciprocate in this cooperative interaction. This could explain the widespread cooperative cross-feeding observed in natural populations.
互惠共生是一种常见的微生物相互作用方式，其中不同物种之间交换营养物质。这种行为可以被视为一种互惠利他主义或互惠合作的形式。过去的理论工作表明，与其他类型的合作相比，自然界中合作互惠共生的进化可能更具挑战性。在这里，我们重新评估了以前用于研究互惠共生持久性的数学模型，并得出结论，与以前观察到的相比，互惠共生相互作用的维持可能更有利于更大的参数范围。引人注目的是，我们还发现，大量的互惠共生者不一定容易受到最初少数不回馈合作的骗子的灭绝，这些骗子从互惠共生中受益，但不进行互惠合作。这可以解释为什么在自然种群中广泛存在着合作互惠共生现象。
