Individual Behavior and Population Processes: Spatial and Multi-trophic Aspects of Insect-Plant and Host-Parasitoid Interactions

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Most organisms live in worlds that are spatially structured. The purpose of this grant is to use dynamic, state variable models (which couple environmental and physiological parameters in a consistent manner) to study spatial and multi- trophic level aspects of insect-plant and host-parasitoid interactions. In the course of this work, three main goals will be achieved. First, the methodology of dynamic state variable modeling will be extended to include spatial structure. Second, such extended models will be used to determine how the descriptions of how populations change over space or time arise from individual behavior. Third, the predictions of the theory will be tested using a three trophic level system consisting of a plant, a fruit fly that attacks the seeds of the plant, and a wasp that attacks the fruit fly. The experimental system chosen uses a fly that is closely related to the apple maggot fly, so that insights learned in this work may have important applied implications in pest control. The combination of experiment and theory is ideal for the development of new and important insights into behavioral evolutionary ecology.