Collective Philanthropy: Describing and Modeling the Ecology of Giving

Reflective of income and wealth distributions, philanthropic gifting appears to follow an approximate power-law size distribution as measured by the size of gifts received by individual institutions. We explore the ecology of gifting by analysing data sets of individual gifts for a diverse group of institutions dedicated to education, medicine, art, public support, and religion. We find that the detailed forms of gift-size distributions differ across but are relatively constant within charity categories. We construct a model for how a donor''s income affects their giving preferences in different charity categories, offering a mechanistic explanation for variations in institutional gift-size distributions. We discuss how knowledge of gift-sized distributions may be used to assess an institution''s gift-giving profile, to help set fundraising goals, and to design an institution-specific giving pyramid.     

Understanding Recurrent Crime as System-Immanent Collective Behavior

Containing the spreading of crime is a major challenge for society. Yet, since thousands of years, no effective strategy has been found to overcome crime. To the contrary, empirical evidence shows that crime is recurrent, a fact that is not captured well by rational choice theories of crime. According to these, strong enough punishment should prevent crime from happening. To gain a better understanding of the relationship between crime and punishment, we consider that the latter requires prior discovery of illicit behavior and study a spatial version of the inspection game. Simulations reveal the spontaneous emergence of cyclic dominance between “criminals”, “inspectors”, and “ordinary people” as a consequence of spatial interactions. Such cycles dominate the evolutionary process, in particular when the temptation to commit crime or the cost of inspection are low or moderate. Yet, there are also critical parameter values beyond which cycles cease to exist and the population is dominated either by a stable mixture of criminals and inspectors or one of these two strategies alone. Both continuous and discontinuous phase transitions to different final states are possible, indicating that successful strategies to contain crime can be very much counter-intuitive and complex. Our results demonstrate that spatial interactions are crucial for the evolutionary outcome of the inspection game, and they also reveal why criminal behavior is likely to be recurrent rather than evolving towards an equilibrium with monotonous parameter dependencies.     

Sensory Ecology,Evolution,and Behavior

<正>1 Introduction Sensory ecology deals with how animals capture information from their environment,and the sensory systems involved in doing so(Hailman,1977;Lygoe,1979;Dusenbery, 1992;Mappes and Stevens 2010).Although the term     

Sensory Ecology, Evolution, and Behavior

1 Introduction Sensory ecology deals with how animals capture in formation from their environment, and the sensory sys tems involved in doing so (Hailman, 1977; Lythgoe, 1979; Dusenbery, 1992; Mappes and Stevens 2010). Although the term sensory ecology itself is compara tively recent, its basis has a long history, in part due to numerous links with subjects such as neurobiology, physiology, ethology, and evolutionary behavioral ecology.     

Collective Cell Behavior in Mechanosensing of Substrate Thickness

Extracellular matrix stiffness has a profound effect on the behavior of many cell types. Adherent cells apply contractile forces to the material on which they adhere and sense the resistance of the material to deformation—its stiffness. This is dependent on both the elastic modulus and the thickness of the material, with the corollary that single cells are able to sense underlying stiff materials through soft hydrogel materials at low (<10 μm) thicknesses. Here, we hypothesized that cohesive colonies of cells exert more force and create more hydrogel deformation than single cells, therefore enabling them to mechanosense more deeply into underlying materials than single cells. To test this, we modulated the thickness of soft (1 kPa) elastic extracellular-matrix-functionalized polyacrylamide hydrogels adhered to glass substrates and allowed colonies of MG63 cells to form on their surfaces. Cell morphology and deformations of fluorescent fiducial-marker-labeled hydrogels were quantified by time-lapse fluorescence microscopy imaging. Single-cell spreading increased with respect to decreasing hydrogel thickness, with data fitting to an exponential model with half-maximal response at a thickness of 3.2 μm. By quantifying cell area within colonies of defined area, we similarly found that colony-cell spreading increased with decreasing hydrogel thickness but with a greater half-maximal response at 54 μm. Depth-sensing was dependent on Rho-associated protein kinase-mediated cellular contractility. Surface hydrogel deformations were significantly greater on thick hydrogels compared to thin hydrogels. In addition, deformations extended greater distances from the periphery of colonies on thick hydrogels compared to thin hydrogels. Our data suggest that by acting collectively, cells mechanosense rigid materials beneath elastic hydrogels at greater depths than individual cells. This raises the possibility that the collective action of cells in colonies or sheets may allow cells to sense structures of differing material properties at comparatively large distances.     

Food, Feeding Behavior and Feeding Ecology of Nemerteans

The feeding biology of nemerteans is reviewed, new informationis presented, and the role of nemerteans in natural communitiesis discussed and evaluated. Most nemerteans are carnivorous,the majority feeding on live, often specific, prey, while someare scavengers. Macrophagous feeding is found in the Palaeonemertea,Heteronemertea and some of the Hoplonemertea; the more specializedsuctorial feeding is limited to five of the hoplonemertean families,and suspension feeding (omnivorous diet) occurs only in thehighly specialized symbiotic monogeneric Bdellonemertea. Feeding adaptations seem to be related to the nature and employmentof the proboscis, the dilatability of the mouth, and the structureof the anterior part of the digestive tract. The transport ofdissolved organic materials from seawater has been demonstrated,but its role in nemertean nutrition is just being contemplated.Present meager information on predation has shown nemerteansto have actually and potentially large effects on prey populationsand thus on the communities in which they live. As the feedingbiology of only a relative handful of species has been studied,much basic comparative research is needed before we can corroborateor refute our present ideas concerning the ecological rolesof nemerteans.     

Spatial and Functional Heterogeneities Shape Collective Behavior of Tumor-Immune Networks

Tumor growth involves a dynamic interplay between cancer cells and host cells, which collectively form a tumor microenvironmental network that either suppresses or promotes tumor growth under different conditions. The transition from tumor suppression to tumor promotion is mediated by a tumor-induced shift in the local immune state, and despite the clinical challenge this shift poses, little is known about how such dysfunctional immune states are initiated. Clinical and experimental observations have indicated that differences in both the composition and spatial distribution of different cell types and/or signaling molecules within the tumor microenvironment can strongly impact tumor pathogenesis and ultimately patient prognosis. How such “functional” and “spatial” heterogeneities confer such effects, however, is not known. To investigate these phenomena at a level currently inaccessible by direct observation, we developed a computational model of a nascent metastatic tumor capturing salient features of known tumor-immune interactions that faithfully recapitulates key features of existing experimental observations. Surprisingly, over a wide range of model formulations, we observed that heterogeneity in both spatial organization and cell phenotype drove the emergence of immunosuppressive network states. We determined that this observation is general and robust to parameter choice by developing a systems-level sensitivity analysis technique, and we extended this analysis to generate other parameter-independent, experimentally testable hypotheses. Lastly, we leveraged this model as an in silico test bed to evaluate potential strategies for engineering cell-based therapies to overcome tumor associated immune dysfunction and thereby identified modes of immune modulation predicted to be most effective. Collectively, this work establishes a new integrated framework for investigating and modulating tumor-immune networks and provides insights into how such interactions may shape early stages of tumor formation.     

从文献看种群、种群生态及种群行为研究

通过维普中文期刊网和英文ScienceDirect数据库有关种群、种群生态和种群行为文献的查询,发现文献的发表量很不平衡,种群研究文献的年增长率远大于种群生态和种群行为。英文文献中关于种群行为研究的文献增长率高于种群生态,而中文文献正好相反。