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Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America logoLink to Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America
. 1995 Mar 28;92(7):2524–2528. doi: 10.1073/pnas.92.7.2524

Ecological chaos in the wake of invasion.

J A Sherratt 1, M A Lewis 1, A C Fowler 1
PMCID: PMC42250  PMID: 7708678

Abstract

Irregularities in observed population densities have traditionally been attributed to discretization of the underlying dynamics. We propose an alternative explanation by demonstrating the evolution of spatiotemporal chaos in reaction-diffusion models for predator-prey interactions. The chaos is generated naturally in the wake of invasive waves of predators. We discuss in detail the mechanism by which the chaos is generated. By considering a mathematical caricature of the predator-prey models, we go on to explain the dynamical origin of the irregular behavior and to justify our assertion that the behavior we present is a genuine example of spatiotemporal chaos.

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Selected References

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