Theoretical rate of plasmid loss

[Anthony Smith]

Greetings all

Can anyone point me in the direction of a Ref. for calculating  what 
percentage of a population of cells will loose their plasmids given that the 
plasmids have no stability region (ie: plasmids are randomly partitioned to 
each daughter). I wish to be able to plot a graph of generation vs. 
percentage of population that still contain a plasmid given that no 
selection has been used since generation 0. I would also like to be able to 
repeat the calculation assuming that the plasmids ARE platitioned (ie: 
thatthe plasmid has a par function)

In nushell: If I have a plasmid of copy number n and I grow it for z 
generations without selction what proportion of the population will retain 
the plasmid.

Lots of thanks

Ant Smith
Department of Microbiology - University of Cape Town
ant at molbiol.uct.ac.za
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Anthony Smith
Dept. Microbiology
University of Cape Town
South Africa
Ant at molbiol.uct.ac.za