Understanding the dynamics of predator-prey populations dispersing in heterogeneous habitat

我的研究计划的目标是在当前气候变化和栖息地破碎化加剧的压力下，将目前对捕食者-猎物系统动力学的理解扩展到高度相关的新情况。我的研究重点是空间明确的系统，在这些系统中，捕食者-猎物的相互作用与在斑块状景观中的运动相结合。资源可得性的空间差异对种群动态具有重要影响，在当前景观重构的压力下，了解异质景观对种群动态的影响具有重要意义。当人类的利益决定需要扰乱生态系统时，例如，采用有害生物管理战略或收获一种资源，常住人口就会从其平衡分布中流离失所。然后，这些种群必须进行调整，这些短暂的动态可以导致初始平衡状态的恢复，或者导致一个全新的状态。例如，相对稳定的昆虫群落在使用杀虫剂后可能变得非常不稳定。在这种情况下，控制害虫的努力最初确实减少了害虫的数量，但也消除了害虫的捕食者。因为害虫的生长速度比它的捕食者要快得多，害虫的数量会首先恢复并呈指数增长。在这种情况下，害虫控制的意想不到的后果是害虫爆炸的产生。这种次要后果可以通过事先了解系统行为来预防或减轻。

The goal of my research program is to expand current understanding of predator-prey system dynamics to novel situations of high relevance under the current pressures of climate change and increased habitat fragmentation. My focus is in spatially-explicit systems where predator-prey interactions are coupled with movement across patchy landscapes. Spatial variation in resource availability has a strong effect on population dynamics, and under current landscape reconfiguration pressures, an understanding of the effect of heterogeneous landscapes on population dynamics is highly relevant. When human interests dictate the need to disturb an ecosystem by, for example, applying pest management strategies or harvesting a resource, resident populations are displaced from their equilibrium distributions. These populations must then adjust, and these transient dynamics can lead either to a restoration of the initial equilibrium state, or to an entirely new state. For example, relatively stable insect communities can become wildly unstable after the application of insecticide. In this case, efforts to control an insect pest do initially reduce the pest population, but also remove the pest's predators. Because the pest has a much higher growth rate than its predators, the pest population recovers first and can grow exponentially. The unintended consequence of pest control, in this case, is creation of a pest explosion. Such secondary consequences can be prevented, or mitigated, with prior knowledge of system behaviour.