Presented by Jeong-Mo Choi, Bryan Weinstein, and Amy Gilson

Did you know that principles and equations from physics can be used to study evolution? We’ll describe how physics-based models can be used to predict evolution, on the level of individual molecules and whole populations. First, Jeong-Mo will describe how scientists began to use quantitative models to study evolution and explain some of the things we’ve learned from this approach. (A preprint including Jeong-Mo’s research can be found here: http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2016/12/08/090258) Next, Bryan will show us examples of bacterial evolution in action (data from his own research!) and describe how he uses physics and mathematics to make sense of his results. Finally, Amy will explain how evolution originates from changes in molecules and how all of this relates to the development of bacterial resistance to antibiotics, the annual flu shot, the prevalence of human diseases such as Huntington’s and sickle cell anemia, and much more. Join us afterwards to look at Bryan’s bacterial evolution experiments and for a demo of the computer simulations that we use to study evolution.

Lecture

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