Evolution of Cooperation
How do groups of individuals become a new kind of individual? This is the basic question motivating our work on evolutionary transitions in individuality. The evolution of cooperation is a fundamental process in the evolutionary transitions of individuality. Because lower level units have an evolutionary advantage if they cheat and gain lower-level fitness at the expense of the group, mechanisms to mediate this conflict are necessary for evolutionary transitions in individuality. The Michod Lab has investigated evolutionary mechanisms to mediate lower-level conflict such as germ-soma segregation, mutation rate, single-celled propagules thereby enhancing cooperation and the emergence individuality at the group level.