#25 – Will Ratcliff: Multicellularity and social evolution

Will Ratcliff is an Associate Professor in the School of Biological Sciences at Georgia Tech. His lab combines mathematical modelling, synthetic biology and experimental evolution, in particular long term evolution experiments (LTEEs), to study the evolution of multicellularity and the spatial dynamics of microbial social interactions. TIMESTAMPS (00:31) – Categorisation of multicellularity (12:04) – Selection pressure for multicellularity in aggregative organisms (19:40) – Darwinian definition of individuality (23:22) – Experimental study of selection for multicellularity and LTEE (44:50) – Entanglement in biology (48:57) – Is it easy to evolve multicellular life? (58:47) – Using phylogenetic trees (1:07:37) – Microbial social interactions and their spatial dynamics (1:17:25) – Discussion of the article 'Bacterial species rarely work together' (1:28:33) – Advice for young scientists NOTES Free version of the book on evolution of multicellularity: https://t.co/CDQdyW1lXZ MuLTEE thread: https://twitter.com/wc_ratcliff/status/1423359901766602755?s=20&t=UrBEBZZMZQCjeHaw-0vCyg New paper examining clonal development and aggregation directly: https://twitter.com/wc_ratcliff/status/1550585020376649729?s=20&t=UrBEBZZMZQCjeHaw-0vCyg Guide to public speaking: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1j4U4VjoTOK5tQLoLxr4W7qfwa35Yy2Dv/view?usp=sharing The article we discussed on bacterial social interactions: https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.abn5093