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A Model Of Band-Pass Phenotypic Resistance In A Modified Beverton-Holt Framework, Louis R. Nemzer

Louis R Nemzer

A new mathematical model of phenotypic bacterial resistance to a periodically applied antibiotic is presented. Using a modified Beverton–Holt framework, and without appealing to any explicit internal timescale or heritable mutations, we map the parameter-space regions corresponding to bacterial colony survival or extinction. It is demonstrated that band-pass behavior, in which colony survival occurs at intermediate – but not short or long – antibiotic application periods, is a possible regime for some initial population values if the bactericidal activity is sufficient. However, below this threshold value of antibiotic efficacy, a ‘‘fixed-point catastrophe’’ occurs, and colony extinction does not occur when …