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The DNA sequencing revolution has revealed enormous microbial diversity. Less well known is that, for many species, this extends down to much finer scales with strains, sub-strains, and sub-sub-strains coexisting, directly competing, and continually evolving. Why doesn’t “survival of the fittest” drive most of these extinct? After introducing some striking examples, the possibility that such diversity is a general consequence of the complexity of biology will be explored via simple models and statistical physics approaches.

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Daniel Fisher, Stanford University
Theory seminar room (old building)
Contact: Leon Seeger and Michael Lässig