Sustained Coevolution Research Articles

FORMATION OF PROFESSIONAL AND ENVIRONMENTAL RESPONSIBILITY IN FUTURE ENVIRONMENTALS AS A SUBJECT OF COMMUNICATIVE INTERACTION WITH BUSINESS SUBJECTS

The article reveals the problem of the formation of professional environmental responsibility in future ecologists as a subject of communicative interaction with business entities. The categories “social environmental responsibility”, “professional environmental responsibility”, “positive individual professional environmental responsibility” were considered. It has been established that positive individual professional environmental responsibility differs from the above-mentioned qualities by a higher level of generalization, as it contains, in addition to legal and social aspects, an ethical aspect, which is the main motivated and natural regulator of individual behavior, striving for an ecologically appropriate, ecologically safe and healthy lifestyle for themselves, other members of society and nature. The structural and functional characterization of professional and environmental responsibility as a unity of three components: value, information-cognitive and behavioral. The definition of the concept of “professional and environmental responsibility of future ecologists” is presented as an integral, interactive, ethical and professionally significant quality of the individual, which manifests itself in the free choice of positive (useful for man, society and nature), ecologically appropriate, safe and competent activities in the system of “man-society-nature”, aimed both at its self-preservation and self-realization, as well as at achieving the strategic setting of the transition of humanity and the Earthʼs biosphere to sustainable co-evolution. It is inserted that the problem of formation of professional and environmental responsibility among future ecologists is fundamentally different from the problem of the functioning of the model of formation of professional and environmental responsibility in them as an expectation of the desired future. The structural and functional characteristics of the main construct of the developed model of the formation of professional environmental responsibility of future ecologists as a unity of three components are presented.

Coevolution Analysis of the Sustainable Development Systems of Energy Firms From a Strategic Philanthropy Perspective

As the objectives of the “dual carbon goal”—reaching peak carbon emissions by 2030 and achieving carbon neutrality by 2060—continue to be promoted, the fulfilment of social responsibilities is critical in enabling energy firms to achieve sustainable development goals. However, due to the frequent occurrence of nonstrategic charitable behaviors, energy firms cannot effectively manage the outcomes of charity. This affects the sustainable development processes of energy firms. While previous studies have mainly focused on the assessment of the economic, social, and environmental dimensions of the static evaluation of sustainable development, few studies focus on the coevolution analysis of the triple combination. To explore the coevolution of the sustainable development systems of energy firms from the perspective of strategic philanthropy, based on triangular fuzzy numbers, a multiattribute evaluation system has been used. This system integrates strategy features, sustainability features, adaptability features, and matching degrees. It has been used to improve the traditional Belousov–Zhabotinsky (B-Z) reaction model, otherwise known as complex system theory. The coevolution model of sustainable development systems stemmed from the perspective of strategic philanthropy. The feasibility of the dynamic model was verified using data from Chinese energy enterprises (Firm-G and Firm-S) gathered between 2011 and 2020. The improved “B-Z” model proposed in this study is able to dynamically simulate the sustainable coevolution track of energy firms and the action mechanism of strategic philanthropy, which provides new decision-making ideas and methods to enable energy firms to effectively manage the behaviors and effects of strategic philanthropy.

Co-Encapsulation of Rhenium and Ruthenium Complexes into the Scaffolds of Metal–Organic Framework to Promote CO2 Reduction

The molecular complexes of Re(4,4′-dcbpy)(CO)3Cl (dcbpy = dicarboxylicacid-2,2’-bipyridyl) and [Ru(dcbpy)3]2+ are co-assembled into UiO-66 scaffolds as structural imperfects for CO2 photocatalytic reduction (named as Re-Ru@U). The prepared catalysts are characterized by XRD, Fourier-Transform infrared (FTIR) spectra, X-ray photoelectron spectra (XPS) and N2 adsorption–desorption isotherms. The intact structure of molecular complexes within the matrix are monitored by 1H nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectra through a totally digesting catalyst. The optical properties are studied via absorption and photoluminescence spectra, and the single-electron reduction in Re and Ru complexes is detected by electron paramagnetic resonance (EPR) spectra. An excellent photocatalytic performance is obtained with steady and sustained CO evolution and a turnover number (TON) value of 15 (11 h). The CO activity irradiating by single wavelength presents the absorption-intensity-dependent changing tendency, where the absorption intensity is superposed by Re and Ru complexes. The two radicals related to Re and Ru, respectively, are simultaneously detected in the Re-Ru@U catalyst. It is suggested that the ReC2 component serves as both a photosensitizer and a catalyst, and the RuC2 component works as an additional photosensitizer to supply the second electron for CO2 reduction. The co-assembling of dual metals Re and Ru in the matrix promotes the electron transfer from the reductive Ru centres to one-electron-reduced Re centres and accounts for the superior activity of CO evolution. Our results demonstrate a strategy to develop the multimetallic catalysts via facile assembling into MOF scaffolds to promote photocatalytic performance.

Impacts of sea-access roads on wetland landscape dynamics in the Yellow River Delta front

The coevolution between oilfield development and deltaic wetlands is critical for ensuring environmental sustainability in mega-deltas. In the Yellow River Delta (YRD), the construction of offshore artificial islands and their sea-access roads (SARs) in delta fronts, providing accommodation for oilfields development of oilfields influences the evolution of adjacent wetland landscapes. This study utilized the threshold segmentation method based on MNDWI and the object-oriented random forest algorithm to extract the shoreline and classify typical wetland vegetation in the study area. It also analysed the impact of SAR on the landscape dynamics of coastal wetlands from 2004 to 2020. The results show that the SAR significantly affected the local sediment transport and erosion and accretion patterns in its adjacent coast, which has gone through accretion-domination, erosion, and continuous accretion stages, with significant accretion and erosion on the north and south sides of the SAR, respectively. From 2004 to 2020, 13.74 km2 of new-born wetland was formed, and the vegetation dynamics in the study area transformed from primary succession to human-disturbed succession. Spartina alterniflora (S. alterniflora) grew rapidly from 4.15 km2 to 18.04 km2 during 2010–2016, showed an imbalanced distribution on both sides of the SAR. This research can provide references for the sustainable coevolution of offshore oilfields and coastal environments.

Delayed feedback between adaptive reservoir operation and environmental awareness within water supply-hydropower generation-environment nexus

In order to ensure sustainable coevolution of water supply, hydropower generation and environment (WHE), the impact of the delayed feedback between adaptive reservoir operation and environmental awareness on WHE nexus is explored in this paper through comprehensive analysis incorporating the policy, social, economic, and environmental factors. The WHE nexus states referring to water storage in reservoir, population, water use, hydropower generation, environmental awareness, and behavior response of community, have been mimicked using the WHE model. The delaying time caused by the delayed feedback can be estimated from the state processes through two indexes (i.e., response delay and recovery delay). Progressive Optimality Algorithm-Particle Swarm Optimization (POA-PSO) hybrid algorithm is adopted to search for an optimal water level process and water transfer. Moreover, the model parameter sensitivity analysis is conducted to determine the dominant model parameters affecting the time delays. Taking Jiayan reservoir as a case study, the Nash-Sutcliffe Efficiency coefficients of the WHE nexus model are above 0.5 in both calibration and validation period. The delay time between environmental awareness and decision preferences ranges from 0 to 8 years under parameter variations. The decision preference has a quicker response to the rise of the water shortage awareness (0.4 years) than the ecological awareness (5.3 years). The most sensitive parameters affecting the delay times are the response rate, decay rate, and threshold of environmental awareness. The proposed model helps us to understand the feedback among adaptive reservoir operation, environmental awareness and decision preferences, and further gives a new access to make effective and scientific long-term adaptive reservoir operation for the human society-environment coupled system.

Sustained coevolution of phage Lambda and Escherichia coli involves inner- as well as outer-membrane defences and counter-defences.

Bacteria often evolve resistance to phage through the loss or modification of cell surface receptors. In Escherichia coli and phage λ, such resistance can catalyze a coevolutionary arms race focused on host and phage structures that interact at the outer membrane. Here, we analyse another facet of this arms race involving interactions at the inner membrane, whereby E. coli evolves mutations in mannose permease-encoding genes manY and manZ that impair λ’s ability to eject its DNA into the cytoplasm. We show that these man mutants arose concurrently with the arms race at the outer membrane. We tested the hypothesis that λ evolved an additional counter-defence that allowed them to infect bacteria with deleted man genes. The deletions severely impaired the ancestral λ, but some evolved phage grew well on the deletion mutants, indicating that they regained infectivity by evolving the ability to infect hosts independently of the mannose permease. This coevolutionary arms race fulfils the model of an inverse gene-for-gene infection network. Taken together, the interactions at both the outer and inner membranes reveal that coevolutionary arms races can be richer and more complex than is often appreciated.

Abstract A104: A stochastic model of tumor-immune evasion predicts sustained coevolution and tumor antigen downregulation

Abstract The dynamical interaction between a growing cancer population and the adaptive immune system generates diverse evolutionary trajectories that ultimately result in tumor clearance or immune escape. Here we create a simple mathematical model of T-cell recognition of tumor-associated antigens. We show that declines in T-cell turnover declines explain differences in early incidence data for almost all cancer types. Fitting the model to evolutionary data argues in favor of substantial and sustained immune pressure exerted on a developing tumor, suggesting that measured incidence is a small proportion of all cancer initiation events. Extending our model to account for the number of distinct tumor antigens, we solve for the optimal cancer evasion strategy and demonstrate that such a population-level strategy predicts that the accumulation rate of cancer mutations is a reflection of the tumor microenvironment and determined by the balance of cancer evasion costs and host recognition rate. We apply our framework to combination drug therapy and quantify the difference in predicted efficacy of combination therapy vs. sequential monotherapy. More generally, this framework has significant implications for understanding drug resistance in the face of an adaptive threat. Citation Format: Jason T. George, Herbert Levine. A stochastic model of tumor-immune evasion predicts sustained coevolution and tumor antigen downregulation [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the AACR Special Conference on Tumor Immunology and Immunotherapy; 2019 Nov 17-20; Boston, MA. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Immunol Res 2020;8(3 Suppl):Abstract nr A104.

Sustained Coevolution in a Stochastic Model of Cancer-Immune Interaction.

The dynamic interactions between an evolving malignancy and the adaptive immune system generate diverse evolutionary trajectories that ultimately result in tumor clearance or immune escape. Here, we create a simple mathematical model coupling T-cell recognition with an evolving cancer population that may randomly produce evasive subclones, imparting transient protection against the effector T cells. T-cell turnover declines and evasion rates together explained differences in early incidence data across almost all cancer types. Fitting the model to TRACERx evolutionary data argued in favor of substantial and sustained immune pressure exerted upon a developing tumor, suggesting that clinically observed incidence is a small proportion of all cancer initiation events. This dynamical model promises to increase our quantitative understanding of many immune escape contexts, including cancer progression and intracellular pathogenic infections. SIGNIFICANCE: The early cancer-immune interaction sculpts intratumor heterogeneity through the selection of immune-evasive clones. This study provides a mathematical framework for investigating the coevolution between an immune-evasive cancer population and the adaptive immune system.

Sustainability, collapse and oscillations in a simple World-Earth model

The Anthropocene is characterized by close interdependencies between the natural Earth system and the global human society, posing novel challenges to model development. Here we present a conceptual model describing the long-term co-evolution of natural and socio-economic subsystems of Earth. While the climate is represented via a global carbon cycle, we use economic concepts to model socio-metabolic flows of biomass and fossil fuels between nature and society. A well-being-dependent parametrization of fertility and mortality governs human population dynamics.Our analysis focuses on assessing possible asymptotic states of the Earth system for a qualitative understanding of its complex dynamics rather than quantitative predictions. Low dimension and simple equations enable a parameter-space analysis allowing us to identify preconditions of several asymptotic states and hence fates of humanity and planet. These include a sustainable co-evolution of nature and society, a global collapse and everlasting oscillations.We consider different scenarios corresponding to different socio-cultural stages of human history. The necessity of accounting for the ‘human factor’ in Earth system models is highlighted by the finding that carbon stocks during the past centuries evolved opposing to what would ‘naturally’ be expected on a planet without humans. The intensity of biomass use and the contribution of ecosystem services to human well-being are found to be crucial determinants of the asymptotic state in a (pre-industrial) biomass-only scenario without capital accumulation. The capitalistic, fossil-based scenario reveals that trajectories with fundamentally different asymptotic states might still be almost indistinguishable during even a centuries-long transient phase. Given current human population levels, our study also supports the claim that besides reducing the global demand for energy, only the extensive use of renewable energies may pave the way into a sustainable future.

Host-Pathogen Coevolution: The Selective Advantage of Bacillus thuringiensis Virulence and Its Cry Toxin Genes.

Reciprocal coevolution between host and pathogen is widely seen as a major driver of evolution and biological innovation. Yet, to date, the underlying genetic mechanisms and associated trait functions that are unique to rapid coevolutionary change are generally unknown. We here combined experimental evolution of the bacterial biocontrol agent Bacillus thuringiensis and its nematode host Caenorhabditis elegans with large-scale phenotyping, whole genome analysis, and functional genetics to demonstrate the selective benefit of pathogen virulence and the underlying toxin genes during the adaptation process. We show that: (i) high virulence was specifically favoured during pathogen–host coevolution rather than pathogen one-sided adaptation to a nonchanging host or to an environment without host; (ii) the pathogen genotype BT-679 with known nematocidal toxin genes and high virulence specifically swept to fixation in all of the independent replicate populations under coevolution but only some under one-sided adaptation; (iii) high virulence in the BT-679-dominated populations correlated with elevated copy numbers of the plasmid containing the nematocidal toxin genes; (iv) loss of virulence in a toxin-plasmid lacking BT-679 isolate was reconstituted by genetic reintroduction or external addition of the toxins. We conclude that sustained coevolution is distinct from unidirectional selection in shaping the pathogen's genome and life history characteristics. To our knowledge, this study is the first to characterize the pathogen genes involved in coevolutionary adaptation in an animal host–pathogen interaction system.

Sustainable co-evolution of environmental regulation and oligopolies: moving towards a managerial theory of meta-organisational approaches

The evolution of environmental regulation is largely influenced by the reciprocal influence exerted by policies, natural resources and stakeholders' behaviours in an often disregarded and continuously adapting–by–interacting setting. On the basis of this assumption, we explored the role of oligopolistic industries in shaping the evolution of environmental regulation. In particular, this paper presents the analysis of two real cases and describes the factual chain of causation that could lead to spontaneous dynamics of interaction between industrial leaders, policy makers and local communities in the development of environmental regulation. Findings of this work highlight the pivotal role of meta–organisations in matching the evolution of environmental regulation with the introduction of sustainable practices. What is more, this role seems to emerge spontaneously as a natural consequence of trial–and–error processes. Here, we draw some implications for management to guide oligopolistic industries in designing and implementing corporate strategies that can lead to win-win cooperation with the agents of the meta–organisation.

Age of the Association between Helicobacter pylori and Man

When modern humans left Africa ca. 60,000 years ago (60 kya), they were already infected with Helicobacter pylori, and these bacteria have subsequently diversified in parallel with their human hosts. But how long were humans infected by H. pylori prior to the out-of-Africa event? Did this co-evolution predate the emergence of modern humans, spanning the species divide? To answer these questions, we investigated the diversity of H. pylori in Africa, where both humans and H. pylori originated. Three distinct H. pylori populations are native to Africa: hpNEAfrica in Afro-Asiatic and Nilo-Saharan speakers, hpAfrica1 in Niger-Congo speakers and hpAfrica2 in South Africa. Rather than representing a sustained co-evolution over millions of years, we find that the coalescent for all H. pylori plus its closest relative H. acinonychis dates to 88–116 kya. At that time the phylogeny split into two primary super-lineages, one of which is associated with the former hunter-gatherers in southern Africa known as the San. H. acinonychis, which infects large felines, resulted from a later host jump from the San, 43–56 kya. These dating estimates, together with striking phylogenetic and quantitative human-bacterial similarities show that H. pylori is approximately as old as are anatomically modern humans. They also suggest that H. pylori may have been acquired via a single host jump from an unknown, non-human host. We also find evidence for a second Out of Africa migration in the last 52,000 years, because hpEurope is a hybrid population between hpAsia2 and hpNEAfrica, the latter of which arose in northeast Africa 36–52 kya, after the Out of Africa migrations around 60 kya.

Niche partitioning in the coevolution of 2 distinct RNA enzymes

Organisms that compete for limited resources within a common environment may evolve traits that allow them to exploit distinct ecological niches, thus enabling multiple species to coexist within the same habitat. The process of niche partitioning now has been captured at the molecular level, employing the method of continuous in vitro evolution. Mixed populations of 2 different "species" of RNA enzymes were made to compete for limited amounts of one or more substrates, with utilization of the substrate being necessary for amplification of the RNA. Evolution in the presence of a single substrate led to the extinction of one or the other enzyme, whereas evolution in the presence of 5 alternative substrates led to the accumulation of mutations that allowed each enzyme to exploit a different preferred resource. The evolved enzymes were capable of sustained coevolution within a common environment, exemplifying the emergence of stable ecological niche behavior in a model system. Biochemical characterization of the 2 evolved enzymes revealed marked differences in their kinetic properties and adaptive strategies. One enzyme reacted with its preferred substrate approximately 100-fold faster than the other, but the slower-reacting species produced 2- to 3-fold more progeny per reacted parent molecule. The in vitro coevolution of 2 or more species of RNA enzymes will make possible further studies in molecular ecology, including the exploration of more complex behaviors, such as predation or cooperation, under controlled laboratory conditions.

Sustainable co-evolution

Humankind is dependent upon Earth's ecological life support system, whose well-being, in turn, depends upon the practices of human society. The health of both systems requires harmonious, mutualistic interactions between them. Because of its population size and demographic distribution (increasingly urbanized), humankind is also dependent upon its technological life support system, which, as currently managed, threatens the ecological life support system. A fundamental difference exists between the two systems—humankind is capable of using intelligence and reason to regulate its activities but the 30+ million other life forms that comprise the ecological life support system cannot. As a consequence, empathy for the other system is the responsibility of human society. Sustainable co-evolution requires that human society has a high level of ecological literacy and acts in a nurturing, compassionate way toward the other system. Only then will sustainable co-evolution be possible since both systems are dynamic and continually changing.