Mathematical games between plants and their mutualists

In this talk, I outline four stories on how to comprehend and formulate the emergence, maintenance and functioning of plants and their mutualists, from local to global scales. I start by considering the biotic interactions between plants and their mutualists as games of benefit and cost, and then discuss how we can formulate the coevolution between plants and their mutualists using the evolutionary game theory. Next, I introduce the concept of adaptive interaction switching that can explain the structure and function of mutualistic networks between plants and their mutualists. Finally, I end my talk by speculating the impact of this mutualistic interaction/feedback on species-niche relationship and plant distributions in future climates.