๐Ÿ”ฌ Killing the Winner (Kill the Winner)

Frequency-dependent selection on bacterial phage-susceptibility types as mediated by phages.

by Stephen T. Abedon Ph.D. (abedon.1@osu.edu)

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About this entry: Killing the Winner (Kill the Winner) is one of a growing set of phage biology and phage therapy terms defined here. For more phage terms, see Abedon, S.T. (2025). Phage Therapy Annotated Glossary. Preprints.org. 10.20944/preprints202508.0347.v1

phage.org/terms/killing_the_winner.html  ·  Abedon’s Books  ·  DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.20173633

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Killing the Winner (Kill the Winner): Frequency-dependent selection on bacterial phage-susceptibility types as mediated by phages.

Discussion

<p>Note that the frequency-dependent selection involved in kill the winner can more specifically be described as stabilizing frequency-dependent selection. Note also that contrary to the "winner" state there is phage existence at densities that can be described as numerical refuges.

For review of concept of kill the winner, see Thingstad et al. (2008).

External links

How to cite this page

Abedon, S.T. (2026). Phage Terms. https://terms.phage.org  ·  10.5281/zenodo.20173633

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Killing the Winner (Kill the Winner) — terms.phage.orgphage.org — Stephen T. Abedon — Version 2026.05.14