  Due to the relevance for conservation biology, there is an increasing
interest to extend evolutionary genomics models to plant, animal or microbial
species. However, this requires to understand the effect of life-history traits
absent in humans on genomic evolution. In this context, it is fundamentally of
interest to generalize the replicator equation, which is at the heart of most
population genomics models. However, as the inclusion of life-history traits
generates models with a large state space, the analysis becomes involving. We
focus, here, on quiescence and seed banks, two features common to many plant,
invertebrate and microbial species. We develop a method to obtain a
low-dimensional replicator equation in the context of evolutionary game theory,
based on two assumptions: (1) the life-history traits are {\it per se} neutral,
and (2) frequency-dependent selection is weak. We use the results to
investigate the evolution and maintenance of cooperation based on the
Prisoner's dilemma. We first consider the generalized replicator equation, and
then refine the investigation using adaptive dynamics. It turns out that,
depending on the structure and timing of the quiescence/dormancy life-history
trait, cooperation in a homogeneous population can be stabilized. We finally
discuss and highlight the relevance of these results for plant, invertebrate
and microbial communities.
