Biological Invasions and Patchy Landscapes

The spread of alien species into novel territory is a great threat to many existing ecosystems. Can one predict how fast such biological invasions will proceed? In particular, how fast will a new species spread in a strongly heterogeneous landscape where favourable and unfavourable patches are interspersed? How should evolution select dispersal rates in source-sink landscapes? What happens is patches move due to climate change?

Selected publications (the full list is here)

• F. Hamel, F. Lutscher, M. Zhang (2022) Propagation phenomena in periodic patchy landscapes with interface conditions. Journal of Dynamics and Differential Equations 36: S435–S486

• G. Maciel, C. Cosner, R.S. Cantrell, F. Lutscher (2020) Evolutionarily stable movement strategies in reaction–diffusion models with edge behavior. Journal of Mathematical Biology 80(1-2): 61–92.

• G. Maciel, F. Lutscher (2018) Movement behavior determines competitive outcome and spread rates in strongly heterogeneous landscapes. Theoretical Ecology 11(3): 351–365.

• G.A. Maciel, F. Lutscher (2013) How individual movement response to habitat edges affects population persistence and spatial spread. The American Naturalist 182(1): 42–52

• S. Dewhirst, F. Lutscher (2009) Dispersal in heterogeneous habitats: thresholds, spatial scales, and approximate rates of spread. Ecology 90(5): 1338–1345