Virulence Evolution in Host Populations with Heterogeneous Immune Responses: The Weakening of the Uncommon Weak
Carles Barril, Marina Vegué · 2026
Read Virulence Evolution in Host Populations with Heterogeneous Immune Responses: The Weakening of the Uncommon Weak by Carles Barril, Marina Vegué (2026) in the Tower of Babel, a free online library of public-domain works preserved in clean, searchable text. No sign-up. The full text is served as a plain-text file at a predictable URL, where text is present: https://antarctic-labs.com/tower-of-babel/pmc-13249619.txt.
Description
Barril and Vegué model how a mixed population of hosts steers pathogen nastiness, in a 2026 mathematical biology paper. Their model links two scales: how germs multiply inside one body, and how infection spreads through a population. Hosts differ in immune strength, and that difference turns out to decide which level of virulence evolution favors.
When hosts reliably clear infections fast, germs evolve to be more virulent. When hosts are doomed once infected, gentler germs win instead. Mixing the two host types, with a share of vulnerable individuals, produced richer behavior between those extremes. The authors use the results to argue that immune diversity in a population is itself an evolutionary force.
Catalog record
| CREATOR | Carles Barril, Marina Vegué |
|---|---|
| YEAR | 2026 |
| COLLECTION | PAPERS |
| FORMAT | TXT |
| FILE SIZE | 139 KB |
| VERSION | 1.0 |
| LICENSE | CC BY 4.0 |
| RIGHTS | CC BY |
| SOURCE | Europe PMC |