Bacteria, viruses and cancer cells can act like savvy human investors by diversifying their population against futures shocks just as people hedge their investments with a diversified portfolio against uncertainty.
QUT mathematicians from the QUT Centre for Data Sciance and the ARC Centre of Excellence for Mathematical and Statistical Frontiers applied financial risk management theory to the study of biological population dynamics to better understand an emergent ‘cellular hedging’ strategy that maximises the expected growth rate of bacteria and other microorganisms.