The evolution of age-specific choosiness and reproductive isolation in a model with overlapping generations
By Olivier Cotto (INRAE)
Abstract: The strength of mate choice (choosiness) often varies with age, but theory to understand this variation is scarce. I will approach the evolution of age-specific choosiness from two axes. First, I investigate whether speciation can result in variation of choosiness with age, and whether such variation can in turn a˙ect speciation. I then study how the strength of selection on choosiness changes with age. To approach these questions, I model the genetics of populations with overlapping generations, where females prefer to mate with males matching their phenotype. I will show that speciation can result in the evolution of choosiness changing with age without a˙ecting reproductive isolation between species. I will further present how the strength of selection, affecting both the pace of evolution toward optimal age-specific choosiness and the ability of selection to purge sub-optimal mutations, strongly depends on the life cycle of the organisms under study.
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