Complex noise in diffusion-limited reactions of replicating and competing species

We derive exact Langevin-type equations governing quasispecies dynamics. The inherent multiplicative noise has both real and imaginary parts. The numerical simulation of the underlying complex stochastic partial differential equations is carried out employing the Cholesky decomposition for the noise covariance matrix. This noise produces unavoidable spatiotemporal density fluctuations about the mean-field value. In two dimensions, the fluctuations are suppressed only when the diffusion time scale is much smaller than the amplification time scale for the master species.