Branching structure of genealogies in spatially growing populations and its implications for population genetics inference.
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Publication Date
2022-05-05Journal Title
J Phys Condens Matter
ISSN
0953-8984
Publisher
IOP Publishing
Type
Article
This Version
AM
Metadata
Show full item recordCitation
Eghdami, A., Paulose, J., & Fusco, D. (2022). Branching structure of genealogies in spatially growing populations and its implications for population genetics inference.. J Phys Condens Matter https://doi.org/10.1088/1361-648X/ac6cd9
Abstract
Spatial models where growth is limited to the population edge have been instrumental to understanding the population dynamics and the clone size distribution in growing cellular populations, such as microbial colonies and avascular tumours. A complete characterization of the coalescence process generated by spatial growth is still lacking, limiting our ability to apply classic population genetics inference to spatially growing populations. Here, we start filling this gap by investigating the statistical properties of the cell lineages generated by the two dimensional Eden model, leveraging their physical analogy with directed polymers. Our analysis provides quantitative estimates for population measurements that can easily be assessed via sequencing, such as the average number of segregating sites and the clone size distribution of a subsample of the population. Our results not only reveal remarkable features of the genealogies generated during growth, but also highlight new properties that can be misinterpreted as signs of selection if non-spatial models are inappropriately applied.
Keywords
q-bio.PE, q-bio.PE
Sponsorship
Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EP/P020259/1)
Embargo Lift Date
2100-01-01
Identifiers
External DOI: https://doi.org/10.1088/1361-648X/ac6cd9
This record's URL: https://www.repository.cam.ac.uk/handle/1810/336798
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