Resources
Quantitative genetics card game demonstrating heritability.
Frey, F., Lively, C.M., and Brodie, E.D. III. 2010. Selection and evolution with a deck of cards. Evolution: Education and Outreach 3: 114-120.
Card game for host-parasite coevolution in a metapopulation.
Gibson, A.K., Drown, D.M., and Lively, C. M. 2015. The Red Queen's Race: an experimental card game to teach coevolution. Evolution: Education and Outreach 8:10. See Amanda Gibson's description of the game, educational video, and resources here. (Many thanks to Dr. Kirstin Milks of Bloomington High School South for letting us demo the game in her class, and for her feed back on how to streamline it for 1-hour class periods and HS use.)
Review of the Red Queen for non-specialists
Lively, C. M. 2010. Antagonistic coevolution and sex. Evolution: Education and Outreach 3: 19-25.
Free Book on the Evolutionary Problem of Sex
Lively. C.M. 2024. Through the Looking Glass: I. Why Cross-Fertilize? Indiana University Bloomington Libraries Publishing. https://doi.org/10.5967/gbd3-ka07
Simulation Labs
SIR model. This is an easy-to-edit SIR model with a simple class exercise. The excel file has been adapted into an in-browser Shiny App linked here: https://zoe-dinges.shinyapps.io/SIR_Model.
Evolution of virulence lab. Excel-based worksheet and simple exercise to explore the evolution of parasite virulence. The excel file has been adapted into an in-browser Shiny App linked here: https://zoe-dinges.shinyapps.io/Virulence_Tradeoff_Simulation/
Size/number tradeoff. Life-history simulation showing the size/number trade-off, the ESS solution, and the first and second derivative tests. Advanced: here is the analytical solution as Mathematica file (.nb file added 18Jan2022).
Bet-hedging. This simulation expands on the size-number trade-off idea above, but asks the additional question: what if the environment is temporally variable? The simulation compares any number of "risky" strategies with "bet-hedging" strategies. The motivation and directions for the lab are in this readme file. The key thing is to show how selection operates on the variance in offspring production as well as the among-year average. (added 17Jan2022)
Heritability lab. Simulation exercise showing the effect of changing both heritability and the selection differential on the response to selection. It also shows how the selection differential is related to the selection gradient.
Local mate competition lab. Simulation lab showing how local mate competition selects for female-biased resource allocation in hermaphroditic barnacles. Please also download this readme file for motivation and instructions. Advanced: here is the analytical solution as a Mathematica file. (added 16Jan2022)
Epistasis, linkage disequilibrium, and recombination. An advanced worksheet that shows how epistasis for fitness creates linkage disequilibrium (LD), followed by how recombination reduces LD. (added 16Jan2022)
Long-term data on parasites infecting the New Zealand snail Potamopyrgus antipodarum. Funded in part by grants from the Swiss National Science Foundation to Jukka Jokela, and by NSF LTREB grants to CM Lively and Jukka Jokela.