Cluster formation in a stepping-stone model with continuous, hierarchically structured sites

Abstract

A stepping-stone model with site space a continuous, hierarchical group is constructed via duality with a system of (delayed) coalescing "stable" Lévy processes. This model can be understood as a continuum limit of discrete state-space, two-allele, genetics models with hierarchically structured resampling and migration. The existence of a process rescaling limit on suitably related large space and time scales is established and interpreted in terms of the dynamics of cluster formation. This paper was inspired by recent work of Klenke.