Evolution of intermediate latency strategies in seasonal parasites.

Traditional mechanistic trade-offs between transmission and parasite latency period length are foundational for nearly all theory on the evolution of parasite life history strategies. Prior theoretical studies demonstrate that seasonal host activity can generate a trade-off for obligate-host killer parasites that selects for intermediate latency periods in the absence of a mechanistic trade-off between transmission and latency period lengths. Extensions of these studies predict that host seasonal patterns can lead to evolutionary bistability for obligate- host killer parasites in which two evolutionarily stable strategies, a shorter and longer latency period, are possible. Here we demonstrate that these conclusions from previously published studies hold for non-obligate host killer parasites. That is, seasonal host activity can select for intermediate parasite latency periods for non-obligate killer parasites in the absence of a trade-off between transmission and latency period length and can maintain multiple evolutionarily stable parasite life-history strategies. These results reinforce the hypothesis that host seasonal activity can act as a major selective force on parasite life-history evolution by extending narrower prior theory to encompass a greater range of disease systems.

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© The Author(s) 2024. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the European Society of Evolutionary Biology.