Social interactions and ecological inheritance

报告人：Prof. Charles Mullon

日期：2025年4月15日

时间：15:00-17:00

地点：城环学院366

报告内容简介

Organisms constantly modify their environments, affecting both their own fitness and that of others. These environmentally mediated social behaviourscan shape future generations through ecological inheritance. This talk explores how natural selection influences such behaviours, focusing on negative frequency-dependent selection, which favoursrare types and maintains behaviouraldiversity. Invasion analyses show that ecological inheritance and limited dispersal often create social dilemmas, supporting the coexistence of environmental helpers—who improve conditions at a cost—and free-riders—who benefit without helping. This polymorphism leads to lasting spatial variation in environmental quality. With isolation-by-distance, stable clusters of high- and low-quality habitats emerge and persist, showing how ecological inheritance and movement limits stabilisebehaviouraldiversity and environmental heterogeneity.

报告人简介

After an undergraduate degree in Mathematics, I completed a PhD in evolutionary biology at University College London, where I worked on the evolution of sexual dimorphism. I then moved to the University of Lausanne for a postdoctoral position on the evolution of social polymorphism. After a short period in Japan, I returned to Lausanne in early 2020 to start my research group as an Eccellenza Group Leader. Since 2024, I’ve been a professor of evolutionary ecology.