The Oldest Allele in a Moran Model

Abstract

We study an infinitely many neutral alleles Moran model where the allelic frequencies are recorded in increasing order of the ages of the alleles. Using this representation, we show that in stationarity the number of individuals with the oldest allelic type evolves as a Markov process, even across times when the oldest allele goes extinct (and is immediately replaced by the formerly second oldest allele). We also find the diffusive limit of the oldest allele chain.