Courses / ActivitiesThe Mathematical Modeling of Stoichiometry in Microbial Food Webs
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In chemistry, stoichiometry refers to quantifying relations among masses of substances in chemical reactions, and is the basis for writing chemical formulas and equations. Biological stoichiometry refers relations among masses of substances in physiological and ecological processes. Principles of dynamical mass balance and mass conservation facilitate the formulation and analysis of mathematical models of interactions among species. In particular, competition, predation, and other interactions among microorganisms have been addressed extensively. Many of these models predict limits to biodiversity: in spatially uniform habitats at steady state, the number of competing species that persist is bounded by the sum of the number of resources for which they compete and the number of predator species that attack them. Studies of planktonic algae in lakes provide some evidence for the patterns predicted by this theory. Current research directions include addressing the stoichiometry of multiple nutrient elements, physiological variations in nutrient stoichiometry, and complex dynamics.
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James Grover
2009-01-09
14:00:00 - 15:00:00
308 , Mathematics Research Center Building (ori. New Math. Bldg.)
In chemistry, stoichiometry refers to quantifying relations among masses of substances in chemical reactions, and is the basis for writing chemical formulas and equations. Biological stoichiometry refers relations among masses of substances in physiological and ecological processes. Principles of dynamical mass balance and mass conservation facilitate the formulation and analysis of mathematical models of interactions among species. In particular, competition, predation, and other interactions among microorganisms have been addressed extensively. Many of these models predict limits to biodiversity: in spatially uniform habitats at steady state, the number of competing species that persist is bounded by the sum of the number of resources for which they compete and the number of predator species that attack them. Studies of planktonic algae in lakes provide some evidence for the patterns predicted by this theory. Current research directions include addressing the stoichiometry of multiple nutrient elements, physiological variations in nutrient stoichiometry, and complex dynamics.