Error Threshold of Fully Random Eigen Model

• Published in: Chinese physics letters 2015, Vol.32 (1), p.170-173
• Main Authors: Li, Duo-Fang, Cao, Tian-Guang, Geng, Jin-Peng, Qiao, Li-Hua, Gu, Jian-Zhong, Zhan, Yong
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Computer simulation; Crossovers; Errors; Fluctuation; Mathematical models; Mutations; Randomization; Thresholds; 本征; 物理参数; 物种进化; 生物种群; 相互作用; 误差阈值; 随机模型; 随机过程
• ISSN: 0256-307X; 1741-3540
• DOI: 10.1088/0256-307X/32/1/018702

Species evolution is essentially a random process of interaction between biological populations and their environ- ments. As a result, some physical parameters in evolution models are subject to statistical fluctuations. In this work, two important parameters in the Eigen model, the fitness and mutation rate, are treated as Gaassian dis- tributed random variables simultaneously to examine the property of the error threshold. Numerical simulation results show that the error threshold in the fully random model appears as a crossover region instead of a phase transition point, and ＆s the fluctuation strength increases the crossover region becomes smoother and smoother. Furthermore, it is shown that the randomization of the mutation rate plays a dominant role in changing the error threshold in the fully random model, which is consistent with the existing experimental data. The implication of the threshold change due to the randomization for antiviral strategies is discussed.