Lineal topology and terminal cell organization contribute to the robustness of the <i>C. elegans</i> lineage.

<p>(A–B) Frequency distribution of the robustness of 10,000 random lineages (grey bars) in the presence of (A) necrosis or (B) program failure. These random lineages have exactly the same depths as in <i>C. elegans</i> for all terminal cells but have randomized topologies. The arrow indicates the robustness of the <i>C. elegans</i> lineage. <i>P</i>-value is the probability that a random lineage above created is more robust than the <i>C. elegans</i> lineage. <i>Z</i>-score is the number of standard deviations by which the observation deviates from the mean of the random lineages. (C–D) Frequency distribution of the robustness of 10,000 random lineages (grey bars) in the presence of (A) necrosis or (B) program failure. These random lineages have exactly the same topology as the <i>C. elegans</i> lineage but have their terminal cells randomly relabeled. The arrow indicates the robustness of the <i>C. elegans</i> lineage. <i>P</i>-value is the probability that a random lineage above created is more robust than the <i>C. elegans</i> lineage. <i>Z</i>-score is the number of standard deviations by which the observation deviates from the mean of the random lineages.