Understanding the effects of functional responses in ecological dynamical systems

The main purpose of incorporating functional responses into ecological models has been to add more realism and to help us to mechanistically explain the dynamics of species abundances in nature. Yet, their effects have not been widely understood, especially in multispecies systems. That is, it remains unclear whether the perceived benefits of adding functional responses are simply mathematical artefacts or not. For example, while functional responses have been useful to model the dynamics of 2-species systems, still some functional responses have been criticized for producing unrealistic results. Moreover, it has been unclear the extent to which adding functional responses in multispecies systems can allow the dynamics to reach any type of behavior, contrary to the limits that nature may impose. Thus, it is necessary to fully understand the effect of functional responses on ecological models as it is directly linked to their explanatory power of ecological dynamics.

Name thesis:degree_name

Master

Department dc:contributor.department

Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering

Grantor dc:publisher

Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Year dc:date.issued

2019

Author dc:creator

• AlAdwani, Mohammad S. Kh. F. Sh.

Advisor dc:contributor.advisor

• Serguei Saavedra.

• Civil and Environmental Engineering.

Statement dc:rights

• MIT theses are protected by copyright. They may be viewed, downloaded, or printed from this source but further reproduction or distribution in any format is prohibited without written permission.

Licence dc:rights.uri

• http://dspace.mit.edu/handle/1721.1/7582

Language dc:language.iso

eng

Handle dc:identifier.uri

https://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/121887

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:dspace.mit.edu:1721.1/121887