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Lawton P, Fahimipour AK, Anderson KE. Interspecific dispersal constraints suppress pattern formation in metacommunities. Philos Trans R Soc Lond B Biol Sci 2024; 379:20230136. [PMID: 38913053 DOI: 10.1098/rstb.2023.0136] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/22/2023] [Accepted: 02/12/2024] [Indexed: 06/25/2024] Open
Abstract
Decisions to disperse from a habitat stand out among organismal behaviours as pivotal drivers of ecosystem dynamics across scales. Encounters with other species are an important component of adaptive decision-making in dispersal, resulting in widespread behaviours like tracking resources or avoiding consumers in space. Despite this, metacommunity models often treat dispersal as a function of intraspecific density alone. We show, focusing initially on three-species network motifs, that interspecific dispersal rules generally drive a transition in metacommunities from homogeneous steady states to self-organized heterogeneous spatial patterns. However, when ecologically realistic constraints reflecting adaptive behaviours are imposed-prey tracking and predator avoidance-a pronounced homogenizing effect emerges where spatial pattern formation is suppressed. We demonstrate this effect for each motif by computing master stability functions that separate the contributions of local and spatial interactions to pattern formation. We extend this result to species-rich food webs using a random matrix approach, where we find that eventually, webs become large enough to override the homogenizing effect of adaptive dispersal behaviours, leading once again to predominately pattern-forming dynamics. Our results emphasize the critical role of interspecific dispersal rules in shaping spatial patterns across landscapes, highlighting the need to incorporate adaptive behavioural constraints in efforts to link local species interactions and metacommunity structure. This article is part of the theme issue 'Diversity-dependence of dispersal: interspecific interactions determine spatial dynamics'.
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Affiliation(s)
- Patrick Lawton
- Biophysics Graduate Program, University of California , Riverside, CA, USA
| | - Ashkaan K Fahimipour
- Department of Biological Sciences, Florida Atlantic University , Boca Raton, FL, USA
- Center for Complex Systems and Brain Sciences, Florida Atlantic University , Boca Raton, FL, USA
| | - Kurt E Anderson
- Department of Evolution, Ecology, & Organismal Biology, University of California , Riverside, CA, USA
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Frølich EF, Thygesen UH. Solving multispecies population games in continuous space and time. Theor Popul Biol 2022; 146:36-45. [PMID: 35777532 DOI: 10.1016/j.tpb.2022.06.002] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/26/2021] [Revised: 05/26/2022] [Accepted: 06/23/2022] [Indexed: 11/25/2022]
Abstract
Game theory has emerged as an important tool to understand interacting populations in the last 50 years. Game theory has been applied to study population dynamics with optimal behavior in simple ecosystem models, but existing methods are generally not applicable to complex systems. In order to use game-theory for population dynamics in heterogeneous habitats, habitats are usually split into patches and game-theoretic methods are used to find optimal patch distributions at every instant. However, populations in the real world interact in continuous space, and the assumption of decisions based on perfect information is a large simplification. Here, we develop a method to study population dynamics for interacting populations, distributed optimally in continuous space. A continuous setting allows us to model bounded rationality, and its impact on population dynamics. This is made possible by our numerical advances in solving multiplayer games in continuous space. Our approach hinges on reformulating the instantaneous game, applying an advanced discretization method and modern optimization software to solve it. We apply the method to an idealized case involving the population dynamics and vertical distribution of forage fish preying on copepods. Incorporating continuous space and time, we can model the seasonal variation in the migration, separating the effects of light and population numbers. We arrive at qualitative agreement with empirical findings. Including bounded rationality gives rise to spatial distributions corresponding to reality, while the population dynamics for bounded rationality and complete rationality are equivalent. Our approach is general, and can easily be used for complex ecosystems.
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Affiliation(s)
- Emil F Frølich
- Technical University of Denmark, Department of Applied Mathematics and Computer Science - DTU Compute, Building 303B, Matematiktorvet, 2800, Kgs. Lyngby, Denmark.
| | - Uffe H Thygesen
- Technical University of Denmark, Department of Applied Mathematics and Computer Science - DTU Compute, Building 303B, Matematiktorvet, 2800, Kgs. Lyngby, Denmark.
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Adaptive plasticity in activity modes and food web stability. PLoS One 2022; 17:e0267444. [PMID: 35446908 PMCID: PMC9022794 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0267444] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 12/15/2021] [Accepted: 04/09/2022] [Indexed: 11/19/2022] Open
Abstract
Natural ecosystems are comprised of diverse species and their interspecific interactions, in contrast to an ecological theory that predicts the instability of large ecological communities. This apparent gap has led ecologists to explore the mechanisms that allow complex communities to stabilize, even via environmental changes. A standard approach to tackling this complexity-stability problem is starting with a description of the ecological network of species and their interaction links, exemplified by a food web. This traditional description is based on the view that each species is in an active state; that is, each species constantly forages and reproduces. However, in nature, species’ activities can virtually stop when hiding, resting, and diapausing or hibernating, resulting in overlooking another situation where they are inactive. Here I theoretically demonstrate that adaptive phenotypic change in active and inactive modes may be the key to understanding food web dynamics. Accurately switching activity modes can greatly stabilize otherwise unstable communities in which coexistence is impossible, further maintaining strong stabilization, even in a large complex community. I hypothesize that adaptive plastic change in activity modes may play a key role in maintaining ecological communities.
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Gross T, Allhoff KT, Blasius B, Brose U, Drossel B, Fahimipour AK, Guill C, Yeakel JD, Zeng F. Modern models of trophic meta-communities. Philos Trans R Soc Lond B Biol Sci 2020; 375:20190455. [PMID: 33131442 PMCID: PMC7662193 DOI: 10.1098/rstb.2019.0455] [Citation(s) in RCA: 20] [Impact Index Per Article: 5.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Accepted: 03/17/2020] [Indexed: 02/06/2023] Open
Abstract
Dispersal and foodweb dynamics have long been studied in separate models. However, over the past decades, it has become abundantly clear that there are intricate interactions between local dynamics and spatial patterns. Trophic meta-communities, i.e. meta-foodwebs, are very complex systems that exhibit complex and often counterintuitive dynamics. Over the past decade, a broad range of modelling approaches have been used to study these systems. In this paper, we review these approaches and the insights that they have revealed. We focus particularly on recent papers that study trophic interactions in spatially extensive settings and highlight the common themes that emerged in different models. There is overwhelming evidence that dispersal (and particularly intermediate levels of dispersal) benefits the maintenance of biodiversity in several different ways. Moreover, some insights have been gained into the effect of different habitat topologies, but these results also show that the exact relationships are much more complex than previously thought, highlighting the need for further research in this area. This article is part of the theme issue 'Integrative research perspectives on marine conservation'.
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Affiliation(s)
- Thilo Gross
- University of California Davis, Department of Computer Science, 1 Shields Avenue, Davis, CA 95616, USA
- Alfred Wegener Institut. Helmholtz Zentrum für Polar und Meeresforschung, Am Handelshafen 12, 27570 Bremerhaven, Germany
- Univeristät Oldenburg, Institut für Chemie und Biologie des Meeres, Carl-von-Ossietzky-Strasse 9-11, 26111 Oldenburg, Germany
- Helmholtz Institute for Functional Marine Bidiversity, Ammerländer Heerstrasse 231, Oldenburg, Germany
| | - Korinna T. Allhoff
- Universität Tübingen, Department of Biology, Auf der Morgenstelle 5, 72076 Tübingen, Germany
| | - Bernd Blasius
- Alfred Wegener Institut. Helmholtz Zentrum für Polar und Meeresforschung, Am Handelshafen 12, 27570 Bremerhaven, Germany
- Univeristät Oldenburg, Institut für Chemie und Biologie des Meeres, Carl-von-Ossietzky-Strasse 9-11, 26111 Oldenburg, Germany
| | - Ulrich Brose
- German Centre for Integrative Biodiversity Research, Deutscher Platz 5e, 04103 Leipzig, Germany
- Institute for Biodiversity, Friedrich Schiller University Jena, Dornburger-Strasse 159, 07743 Jena, Germany
| | - Barbara Drossel
- TU Darmstadt, Institut für Festkörperphysik, Hochschulstrasse 6, 64289 Darmstadt, Germany
| | - Ashkaan K. Fahimipour
- National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, Southwest Fisheries Science Center, 110 McAllister Way, Santa Cruz, CA 95060, USA
| | - Christian Guill
- Universität Potsdam, Institut für Biochemie und Biologie, Karl-Liebknecht-Strasse 24-25, 14476 Potsdam, Germany
| | - Justin D. Yeakel
- University of California, Merced, School of Natural Sciences, 5200 North Lake Road, Merced, CA 95343, USA
| | - Fanqi Zeng
- University of Bristol, Department of Engineering Mathematics, Merchant Venturers Building, Bristol BS8 1UB, UK
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