Plants overproduce roots in the presence of neighboring competitors, resulting in the reduction of fitness, which is called the tragedy of the commons (TOC). However, some plants do not show root overproliferation when competing with their relatives. As such, it is known that kin recognition contributes to increasing fitness due to the avoidance of unnecessary competition.
  We constructed a spatially structured model to investigate the evolutionary conditions for cooperative behavior through kin recognition. We assumed that plants could utilize two different strategies (root biomass) depending on whether their competitor was kin or stranger. Plants recognize the competitor as kin if they reach the common ancestor in a certain generation (called kin recognition range). Fitness (seeds production) was defined as the resource gain subtracted the cost for generating roots. The seeds were then dispersed in a certain range. We tested the evolution of two evolutionary variables and their dependence on the seed dispersal range and kin recognition range.
  As a result, the evolutionary outcomes were classified into several groups according to behaivor that is cooperative or competitive to kin and stranger respectively. We then discuss the evolution of cooperative behavior in plants from the viewpoint of the association with life-history strategy.