Speakers
Description
The dynamics and emergent behavior of collectives is a rich area of study in mathematical biology, and this session will focus on contributions to the field ranging from the molecular level all the way up to that of agricultural fields.
In chemical theories of nucleation, growth, and nanoparticle formation, “collective behavior” refers to phenomena where many interacting species (monomers, clusters, ligands, solvent, fields) produce emergent kinetics, structures, or pathways that cannot be reduced to independent-particle events. Our session will consider such behavior in plant pigment systems. In ocean systems at the meter-scale, plankton form a foundational layer of the food web as they interact with larger, filter feeding organisms. We will hear results regarding novel numerical methods for understanding this relationship and how active behavior may affect outcomes. Finally, at the landscape level, locust hopper bands are a well-known example of collective behavior with important implications for food security. Our session will present results on a new data assimilation and model selection pipeline allowing collective behavior models to be parameterized and compared using video data of locusts in the field.
Apart from communicating results about ongoing research, a goal of this minisymposium is to start conversations about how the different perspectives and methods from these varying spatial scales may inform each other and generate new ideas and avenues for research.
